Stephen and Andrew

We are using various microbial inoculants. They all work.

The one we are currently using the most is native microbes we source from virgin bush around us and breed up. We don’t actually know what we are getting other than the fact that there is a huge species range. The majority are probably cellulose digesting bacteria and fungi. We also breed these on again at times and put through the fertigation. The activity in the soil and surface litter layer in the orchard is quite amazing.

We also use rumen paunch material to chelate the nutrient. We can occasionally get hold of cattle paunch material. We have also used sheep and even kangaroo.

We occasionally use fresh cow manure as well for the biological inoculant.

We have also had luck with a lactobacillus brew. We are also putting a few litres of EM into everything.

As for the calcium acetate mix, we have no fixed rules on what we are doing. We just added 180kg calcium acetate and 200L molasses into a 1,000L shuttle. Those numbers were only used to get similar numbers to a commercial calcium product available in Australia. That product is made with hydrated lime, potassium hydroxide and molasses. It is not easy to replicate.

The idea of making our own calcium acetate excites me. It is not a cheap product for us.