The Compost Supershow with guest Leighton Morrison

Compost is one of those words in natural farming that means a lot of different things to different people. And yet we have conversations about compost, assuming we all mean the same thing. I certainly didn't grow up around compost or compost tea, and I only really started considering it when I started focusing on natural farming techniques as an adult. And then of course, I read Teaming with Microbes by Jeff Lo Fells and got really interested.

If you've been listening to Shaping Fire for a while, you've probably been sitting right here with me as I had some of my biggest breakthroughs and understanding what compost is and why it is the essential building block for natural farming. Today is one of those shows, and I bet we learn a lot about compost together. If you wanna learn about cannabis health cultivation and technique efficiently and with good cheer, I encourage you to subscribe to our newsletter.

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So go to shaping fire.com to sign up for the newsletter and be entered into this month's and all future newsletter prize drawings. You are listening to Shaping Fire, and I'm your host, Shago Lows. My returning guest today is Soil biologist Layton Morrison. Layton is a lifelong enthusiast of both aquaponics and living soil. His obsession with Biosphere two led him to set up an aquaculture at the Rodeo

Institute. Layton worked with world renowned biologist, Dr. Elaine Ingham, blending his aquaculture byproducts with compost and wound castings to prove that natural inputs could replace synthetics in commercial cultivation. Layton consults widely for agriculture, soil regeneration, and commercial land management projects throughout the United States, including recently working on the Wallace Annenburg Wildlife Crossing over Highway 1 0 1 in California.

That will be the largest wildlife crossing in the world. Lateness currently founder of Kingdom Aquaponics and invented their line of living, compost and compost t Living soil products. Layton's, a sought after speaker and co-host of a weekly podcast on the Future Cannabis Project YouTube channel. Layton has been on shaping fire a few times before episode 54 about geology and biomimicry and living soil cultivation.

This was the episode that brought Layton's popular Soil Horizons concept into mass adoption episode 59 on water and watering episode 82, about properly using aerobic and anaerobic soil amendments to meet the needs of your soil at different stages. In episode 87 where we do a debrief on the first cycle of the, the shaping fire indoor growing tent, where we test regenerative techniques indoors, including his horizons model for living soil.

So you might ask Shago, why bring back a guest for a fifth time? And that's a fair question and I have two answers. First, have you heard any of the Latent Morrison episodes? They're incredible. The depth in them is hard to ignore. Layton has the scientific background, plus is an ardent natural farmer, and he actually grows stuff and doesn't like live in a lab.

He's kind of like Indiana Jones in a way. He has the academics down solid, but he spends most of his time in the field applying these skills and orchards and soil regeneration projects, research and development, cannabis cultivation. And he's even a consultant for the Dallas Cowboys, keeping their grass practice field thriving. Second, I looked for someone else to be on this show. I got referrals from friends and peers.

Everyone I looked into was an expert at making thermal compost, scoping compost, and teaching it for this episode, though I needed a scientist who could look beyond this one category of thermal compost to the larger picture of soil microbe inoculation, which is what I'm most interested in, and I think is what people actually want when they make compost tea with thermal

compost. So in the end, I called up late and I asked him to join me for this episode, and that I wanted to go big and cover a lot in one episode. During today's episode, the first set is a review of different varieties of compost, their benefits and challenges with a special consideration for the home grower. During the second set, we talk about creating the highest amount of activity in compost, cold compost and how to use it without fear of pathogens.

And we wrap up with the third set discussing compost grain structure, how to make premium cold compost, cold compost extract, and even make compost shelf stable for use throughout the year. Welcome back to Shaping Fire Layton. Uh, thank you Chango. I look forward to it. As always. Yeah, man, it's always great to have you here.

So let's get right into it. You know, uh, I've been thinking about doing this show about the varieties of compost for some time, um, but I really didn't decide to pull the trigger on it until you and I had that conversation just a few days ago where you started kind of like teasing apart, um, this compost question I had in my head. And, and, and you know, even though the mo the the goal of today is to kind of, uh, talk about the, the science of, um,

the sci science and the biology of soil structure. Um, I wanna start with the rather mundane, um, question that I approached you with because, um, even though we're eventually gonna go somewhere heavier and more biological, I can't be the only one who is a cultivator who, who, uh, looks at these different varieties of compost that we have available to us and, and trying to figure out which ones are most viable and which ones

are like, you know, garbage and I shouldn't even consider. So, um, so, so let's, let's go through the list of the, the six varieties of compost that I have come in contact in my world and, and let's just talk about each of them individually, um, so that when, when cultivators who in, um, come in contact with these other types of composts know how to judge them. Okay, so, so let's start with the most common kind of compost,

which is, uh, the bagged stuff that they sell at the store. And, and I'm not even really talking about necessarily like really good quality bagged compost, which I'm assuming there is such a thing. I'm talking about the kind of stuff that they sell for six bucks, um,

in front of the grocery store in the spring. And, um, you know, that stuff come different kinds of company bag those up where, where I live, um, there's a company that actually collects, um, uh, yard refuse yard and garden and food refuse, um, from in front of people's houses. And then they take that to their big facility and they air quote, make compost, and, and then when it's done,

they put it in a bag and they sell it back to us for six bucks. Right? And so, um, you know, it says compost and, and, and so many people are buying it for their gardens and to make their raised beds and lots of people putting it in pots. But you know, I'm by, you know, when I used to buy these, I, you know, you buy it and you rip it open and, um, and I would smell ammonia and it would, it would often have white on it.

And I'm all like, I don't, I I don't think that's my cel that looks like some kind of white rot or something. Um, and then when, you know, as I've gotten more mature in the living soil scene and I've seen the kinds of composts that, um, living soil artisans make, I'm like, How, how dare they sell this bag stuff? Is compost, is it even compost?

So, so let's talk about that first. Um, kind of explain to me, I mean, I know each company makes it different, but I think that by, probably by the time it's in the bag, they're probably pretty similar, So, so teach me a little bit about what my expectations should be for that compost that's in a sealed plastic bag. All right. Um, so let's start with the word compost. Uh, the word compost is a process. It's not a product. It's not a a So I think that that's where the real

conversation, um, begins, is that okay? Um, there are a lot of different types of compost, and again, because I don't have a better word, um, to choose, um, we're gonna use that word, we'll get into what it really means, um, I'm sure in another set. But for the beginning, let's just say this is a compost. So when you smell ammonia, um, that is part of theil breakdown of organic matter, um, you said, well, you, you called it junk. Well, nature doesn't make junk. .

Nature just breaks down, um, organic matter, um, into carbon and nitrogen. Um, all living things are made of carbon and nitrogen along with, you know, other elements, uh, from the el of periodic tables. So just for the sake of keep again, simple, Um, when you smell the ammonia you are in still in what we call a thermal

fillic phase. You haven't, you haven't shifted into the mesophilic. Um, so that means that active decomposition is happening and that ammonia smell is the release, the byproduct of the thermal fights, um, knocking the carbon and the nitrogen off. Um, they can't, they can't eat too much nitrogen. They really are there for the carbon. And so that nitrogen is being released in an amcal gas, ammonia gas. Um, so that product is, is unstable.

If you apply that to, um, like healthy young plants, you're gonna kill them because basically the thermo fights are going to stealing carbon and releasing the nitrogen, um, and therefore starve the plant out because the plant actually wants the nitrogen, or, or I should say the mesophilic bacteria want that nitrogen, um, to break it down and release it to the plant so that they get more exudates.

So you, you're in a, you're in kind of a bind. And, and the other thing, the white you saw, well, that's actually actin bacteria. A lot of people confuse, uh, that white for masum, but it isn't. It's just basically, um, the actin bacteria and it's indicating heat. It's that, that there's still quite a bit of heat present in, in that compost. So that being said, um, you're dealing with a product that is, um, unstable. It wouldn't even be considered, you know, poem, which we'll get into later.

But let's, let's keep me on track here. Right. On. Um, so the, the, the, the stuff that's in these bags, it sounds like it'd be fair to just call it immature, like it is if if our goal was it was a thermal compost, um, I think what you're, I think you're suggesting to me that like, like it wasn't finished. Correct. It was unstable. I see. I think unfinished is a, is a great way to.

Put it. All right, so, so, um, as, as we know from anything, uh, that's made at a scaled level, like, like even cannabis flowers, if you're scaling things up so often the product that comes out is, um, you know, not premium. And, and so these companies, this, these companies are making like, just like thousands and thousands of these bags and they're kind of rushing them through.

And so the fact that we are seeing that bacteria and we're smelling the ammonia and it's still breaking down, um, uh, it's essentially just saying that they rush the process. Ex. Absolutely. And, and the other thing you have to keep in mind too is that at these compost yards, they don't have the ability to separate the greens and the browns.

So that's probably one of the most critical, um, pieces of making, um, especially biological compost, is that you have the correct ratio of greens to browns. If you have too much greens, you have too much nitrogen, it's gonna go hypertherm fillic, and there's nothing you can do to stop. Well, there is, we'll get into that I'm sure later, but there's nothing you can do to prevent that paraphilic phase from continuing until it, there's no nitrogen left, um, to be broken off, um,

to steal the carbon. So that being said, if you can manage your greens and browns, um, you can put a predetermined point in time and say, Well, you know, after six months, this is gonna ha be gone through the thermoy and into the mesophilic. Mesophilic means stable, um, safe to apply, will not, will not steal nitrogen from my plant, and will be a suitable source of, of soil organic carbon, um, that will provide all kinds of benefits to soil.

So, um, so is there a use case for this, right? I mean, you said don't put, don't use this stuff on young plants, um, because it'll, it'll steal from them. Well, I would naturally take that and say, Well, then I, I sure as hell don't wanna put this in my beds and put my clones or my, my seed starts into it, and then I'm all like, Well, I probably don't want to use this in my pots either. Like, is there, is there any use for these this?

Oh, boy, that's, that's a great question. So, um, yeah, it's a herbicide . It will kill plans. Yeah. Yeah. So in my workout here in Cali, um, I'm working with a lot of different farmers and a lot of different, um, you know, growers of different things. When I found out that, um, this company, compost company that I've been working with, um, was using it as a herbicide, I was horrified. It was like, Oh my God, what are we doing? And then I stopped and went, Wait a minute,

I don't care if it's herbicide. It's still carbon, it's still getting put into the soil. It's still providing a longer term, um, source of fertility and CEC cat on exchange capacity, um, which is a valuable resource for, uh, providing long term fertility to plants, whether they're, you know, strawberries or trees, it doesn't matter.

So the fact that they're actually taking this stuff and turning it in, um, is actually a benefit because when you stop thermo fillic phase by taking this immature compost and you till it into the soil, you've, you've, you've basically prevented those thermal fights from, um, producing that excess gas. So therefore you've actually put some acal or nitrate based fertilizer into play because it's no longer gassing off. So it's, it actually has a couple different benefits. Um,

so that being said, what do you do with this compost? Um, I, I would use it as a, a top dressing for, for a, a mature lawn or a top dressing for a mature tree. I wouldn't, I wouldn't go heavy with it, but I would definitely like sprinkle on a, you know, half an inch and then just kind of massage it in, um, because you're going to get some benefit from it in, in that regard. But no way would I put seed starts or clones or anything else into it because you, you're not gonna get a good result.

So it sounds to me that unless we're talking about, uh, putting a whole bunch of it on, on a, on a field or, or a, or distributed, you know, cultivation area, there really isn't much application for this in cannabis growing, which is kind of our point. Correct. All. Right. So. Unless, unless you take it, open it and, and pile it up and let it go through the phase, let. It, So if you're, you bring it home and finish yourself. Correct. Correct.

Uhhuh , um, well, we might as well hit that. How would somebody, let's, let's say that somebody only has access to this kind of stuff. How, how would you easily finish it at home, assuming you don't have a farm? Um, so you take it back to your place and then blend it with, um, other sources of carbon. So, wood chips, uh, straw or not straw. Yeah, straw. Because straw is more of a, a brown than it is a green. It's not hay, hay, is it green? Um, and leaf litter, anything, any source of brown.

Maybe your last year's soil too. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It'd be a great way to, to, to use up some excess soil. Um, so you just blend it together and then pile it up and, and stick your hand in there. And if it's, if it's heating up, add more browns until, until you get to a point where it's no longer heating up to a point where it's,

uh, uncomfortable for your arm. Okay. I mean it, if it's, if it's a 85 degrees, which in many ways is the sweet spot for biological generation, um, it's gonna feel kind of cool to you cuz you're, you run at 90, what, eight mm-hmm. degrees. So, so it wouldn't be uncomfortable. Now if you stick your hand in there and it's hot, that means it's above a hundred degrees, uh, 110, 120 be begins to get very uncomfortable. If, if it's 130,

it's gonna start to burn your arm. So that's a good way to gauge, um, in the field without a, a compost thermometer, um, how you are maturing your compost. All. Right, cool. So let's go to, um, uh, the next, uh, I, I'm making up these kind of bullshit categories myself. So , uh, let's go to the second bullshit category, which is, um, uh,

home food waste compost. Now I wanna be clear, we're gonna, the next, the next variety we're gonna talk about is like, like food waste compost made by an organic garden who's like, read a book and watched some videos and they know what they're doing. Right? So what, what I'm talking about more specifically are people who have got their heart in the right place, but they don't really know what they're doing. All right? So, so there people, they are producing, uh, home food waste.

Maybe they're getting some, some stuff for their neighbors. Um, they don't have anybody with neighborhood pigs to give them to, so they're putting it in an a pile. And whenever they remember it, um, you know, it'll get turned a couple times a year or whatever. And then eventually it do, you know, it does break down. It stops to smell. It's probably got some like, big chunks of stuff in it, right? And, um, but, uh, so it's, it's kinda lackadaisical compost. But, but I come,

I come, I run into that all the time. Um, I will often post to the Vasan Island, you know, farm or, or, or, or food cultivators list and say like, Hey, anybody got excess compost that you're looking to get rid of?

Because I don't really have a lot of space for that. And, um, and, and, you know, sometimes I'll get good stuff, but most of the time it's this, this stuff I'm talking about where, where people are, are making this like, kind of like lackadaisical pile and they're like, Yeah, come, come take this stuff so that I can feel good that I've like moved it back into the biosphere. Um, but I don't know what to do with it. Right? So, so, so what are your thoughts on,

on this kind of stuff? I'm, I'm, I'm guessing you're gonna start with it is also immature. Um, Yeah. And potentially pathogenic. Um, yeah. So that's why when you're dealing with food waste, you really only have three ways to responsibly deal with it. If you just take it and pile it up in the backyard, it's gonna stink. It's gonna attract pests, um, ants, uh, unwanted critters, um, you know, raccoons, you name it.

So not really, um, a smart thing to do. Um, a lot of people that have food waste will often add it to, um, a static compost pile, which is yard waste, leaves and chips and everything else that you've, um, collected in the, uh, spring after the winter and piled up. And, and that's a little bit more safe way to deal with it because you're not gonna attract to those pests necessarily, um, at the same level you would if you just piled it up and let it rot in the

backyard. Um, and you'll also get, um, some benefit to, uh, adding in those browns. Again, greens and browns food waste is pure nitrogen. So it's, it's gonna go hot. Um, it's gonna stink, it's gonna gas off both methane ammonia, um, as and, and like purification gas, you know, gases that not don't necessarily, um, you know,

they're not good terpenes, put it that way. Mm-hmm. . So, um, as far as like dealing with, with, you know, food waste, my recommendations is to, um, get people to either feed them to worms, um, which is a safe way of, of breaking them down and, and avoiding, um, you know, pathogenic, uh, cross-contamination, which is a real issue.

If any of you have, you know, gotten an upset stomach due to something that you ate that was not particularly healthy, um, then you would understand that this is not something that you want to have happened to you. An upset stomach is no joke. So, um, in handling that, it's, it's really, you know, again, feed it to worms first, then take the Verma compost, um, and use that as a supplement in your compost or as a top dressing. But again, it can't be gooey, it can't smell bad.

Um, it has to have had the opportunity to break down to a point where it's no longer going to be potentially pathogenic. So that's really the, the only responsible way to deal with, with like food waste. Um, another thing is, is you can, um, you know, do something that's a little bit more, um, how we say old style, which is to dig a hole and put your, put your food waste in there and put a lid over the top of it and just let

nature do its thing. Um, and, and that's what we would call an anaerobic digestion, because it's going to stink like hell down there. Um, but the microbes will naturally break it down, um, and convert it back into organic matter. Um, so there's another way for you to safely deal with your food waste. Um, and, you know, a lot of times you gotta keep in mind too, like, you know, people, Oh, eggshells, eggshells are great. Well,

they're also got a lot of e coli on them. Uh, and same with meats. You know, those, those meats and, and dairies are, are a little bit more tricky to compost than just fruits and veggies. Um, and fruits have their issue too, because they have a lot of sugar. Uh,

they can attract a lot of pests. But when you get into these, All right, I'm gonna throw everything, including the kitchen sink, no pun intended, um, into my compost pile, you really gotta go thermo fillic, you gotta cook that stuff hard to, uh, prevent any kind of, um, again, attracting paths or, or potential pathogenic, um, you know, uh, contamination.

Um, well, a I never considered the pathogens and I think that's really important, but I gotta tell you gotta say you really got my attention with this, um, anaerobic compost hole. Um, that sounds like a really fun project. Um, is the stuff that will come out of that like rich and delicious for my cannabis plants. After it goes through the digestion process? Absolutely. How long does that process take? Depends on how much you piled in there. Mm-hmm. .

And if you continue to pile on top of it, um, I mean, it's, think of it like, uh, like you ever seen a flow through verma compost, uh, system? Yeah, I have where, where you take from the bottom and you feed the top mm-hmm. in the hole, the bottom is gonna be where the value is. Um, not the top where you just added stuff. So basically you have to let that sit for, cuz you can't harvest from the bottom unless you try to cross tunnel over

. Yeah. Yeah. That's probably, probably too much work for the word. I'm, I'm imagining like, fill, fill, like digging a hole, filling it with like, um, kitchen waste. And then when it's, and then then just fill the hole and then just cover it and leave it, and then go dig another hole. Yes. And then like, maybe I've got like nine holes and I think you're about to tell me about how

long that would take. And so like, okay, I, I make the holes and then after x variable amount of time, I know that I can go back to hole one and use that. And then like some weeks later I can go back to hole two. And then when I pull hole one, I can go refill it. Mm-hmm. . So how, how long, like, let's just say like, you know, reasonably, since I don't have a backhoe, I'm probably not gonna dig a hole that's, you know, much bigger than three by three, let's say.

I wouldn't even go that big, just use a post hold digger, right? So just dig a post hold, you know, like maybe that's. A really small. Six, eight inches around. Yeah. Six, eight inches around. I mean, how much food waste do you generate? Not a lot. Yeah. So I guess, yeah, I guess that's true. Huh. And, and a great way to, um, store it is actually to freeze it so that you can just freeze

as you go throughout the course of the week. Uh, maybe it takes two weeks to to store up enough for a one post hole and, you know, dig the post hole, mark it with a flag, and then cover it over with soil on top. And if you go back probably, I don't know, maybe three, five months, three to six months, you'll have this amazing black organic stuff with tons of worm castings in it.

Wow. Like, and then, and then if they're not three by three holes, I could, you know, I could easily make 25 of these in a row each, with each with their own plant tag given me their, the date that I capped them off. Correct. Um, do I need to worry about the, um, the e coli from the eggshells when I do this style? No, because everything's gonna break down. Mm-hmm. , Um, you're gonna have rapid decomposition in an anaerobic digestion system.

So the, the coli is just gonna get consumed by other biology. Um, what if, what if I'm a cultivator who's in the ground? Um, and I have got like a, a, a cultivation field, Let's just say I've got three rows of five plants, you know, and, uh,

and so I've got like 15 plants. Could I just, um, make these post holes like around my garden and, and then just like, never get them out, just like put 'em in and just cap it and just say, you know, all all of this, uh, all these nutrients will eventually be accessed by the root zone and they'll be pulled from, you know, 3, 4, 5 feet away from the plants and they'll just be pulled over by nature.

And so I'm just kind of, um, creating these little post holes, like little CAEs of nutrition for the soil and the plants. Is that legit? Absolutely. Wow. And I mean, you could take it even further and, um, when you harvest in the fall, um, you know, go next to the root ball. Obviously I don't want you to take that out. It's valuable nutrition, but go next to it and dig a hole and put it in there and next to your plant, right on top of it. Hmm. It'll have six months of digestion. All.

Right. Black gold, dude. Black. Gold. That's really cool idea. All right. Now there is one other piece that I left out in, in dealing with food waste. Um, it's called fermentation. Now, that's been a big topic over the last five years for for sure. You know, j dom and, and natural farming methods.

And so one of the other things you can do, especially if you have a situation where you just, you had a party and you have all this leftover food, like, you know, hamburgers, hot dogs, steak, chicken, pork, whatever, Um, but you just,

you're overwhelmed. You have, you have a, a trash bucket full of food. Um, what you can do is actually take that and cover it with water and put a, uh, like a wire mesh or, or wire cloth over the top of it so it's held down and wait it, um, so that the food and everything underneath it is under the surface of the water. Now this is a way to basically, uh, break it down into enzymes very, very quickly.

And then those enzymes can be used in, again, in a thermal thermo fillic compost, and really make that compost explode biologically because you've got all of the secondary and tertiary melos, uh, in, in biological food. And so of course the biology is just gonna go ballistic when it comes in contact with this stuff cuz it's just ready to eat. It's like, you know, McDonald's and Burger King. Um, so that's another, uh, component to dealing with, with, you know, food waste. Now, do,

would I recommend, you know, doing that on a smaller scale? Probably not. Cuz it's gonna be a pain in the ass. Mm-hmm. , where as, you know, digging a post hole and dumping, you know, some frozen, um, scraps for the last two weeks is a very easy, uh, to do method.

Whereas this fermentation process takes a little bit longer. And again, now you've got this bucket, um, that you have to let sit for a minimum of probably seven days, um, until it, it, you've gotten through the, the, um, fermentation process. And you're probably gonna see foam on the surface of the water. Um, and other indications that it's still very, uh, highly active. And so you do not want toco this while it's in this again, um, anaerobic digestion, uh,

because it's gonna stink like hell. But after a period of, you know, I, you know, it depends again on the size of the container, how much you're dealing with, how much meat versus how much vegetables as to how long it'll take to break down. But after a period of time, it won't even stink anymore. It'll be slimy. You know, you'll probably get like a mother, um, you know, like a kombucha mother on the top of it mm-hmm. . Um,

but it won't smell anymore. And that's when you know, okay, this, this stuff is rocket fuel for biology. Now I take this and add it to my compost pile, It will not stink. And all of those, uh, mobile nutrients, um, that could wash through the soil very quickly if it rained, um, will be consumed very quickly by the biology. Wow. Right on. And, and when it's in the stink stage, do not get that stuff on you . Cause you'll smell for days . Exactly.

All right. So our, our next category, um, is, is going to be, uh, what, for lack of a better term, I'll call it curated compost. So this is the kind of compost that is made by, you know, or organic gardeners your friend who who knows better, took a class,

you know, read a couple books, um, they know what they're doing. And so they're, they're, they're creating their pile and, you know, maybe they're even, um, you know, making sure that certain types of food stuffs are in there so that the compost that comes out of it has a particular nutrition ratio that they're looking for. And, uh, and, and it's getting turned on time and they've got a compost, you know, thermometer. And so, you know, we're, we're talking kinda like creme to the creme of,

of heated compost piles. And, and you're very lucky. They like you, they like the weed that you're growing and they say, Hey, I've got, I've got extra of this stuff. You know, when you wanna bring over your pickup and, you know, get what you want. And then you're, you're like, hell yeah. And you go over. So, so tell me about this compost compared to the other stuff we were talking about so far. All right. So I'd have to believe, um, that this, this compost curator has,

has gone through the thermo phase and into the meso. In other words, didn't rush it. Um, used the proper green brown relationship. Um, whether they used food waste or manure. We, we call those high nitrogen sources. Um, as long as they're using high nitrogen sources responsibly, so less than 10%. Um, and they are going through the process of turning it, like you said, until that gets to the point where it no longer continues to go. Theil, now you've pushed it into the meso fillic phase.

Now you have a, what I want to call nutrient dense compost. Um, so there's a high value of nutrition there, but I'm not saying that there's biology there. And this is, this is something that, um, I've learned over the years. I've, you know, been across the country, I don't know how many times worked with clients all over. Um,

I've worked with people as, Oh my God, I make the best compost. You know, old hippies that, that, you know, that've been around for a long time, uh, worked with dairy farmers, horse farmers, you name it. Generally speaking, the one piece that they're all missing is the biology. Biology takes perhaps a year or two to come back into that pile after it's gone. Thermo fillic, um, to a point where it would get into the realm just getting close to the realm of what I would call a biological inoculate.

So that guy on the farm who's, you know, through his, you know, his yard scraps and his, his vegetable scraps probably not as meat cause he doesn't wanna attract the pests, um, into his pile and, and, you know, turned it or, or left it static. I mean, that's another way to deal with it. Um, static just takes longer for it to break down. But you're, you're getting, you're gonna get a better biological compost, uh,

from static versus turning. Cuz every time you turn that pile, every time you expose those microbes to uv to oxidation through exposure to air, um, you're, you're knocking them way back. You're, you're basically, um, pushing them into a cyst form or into a, um, you know, a form where they're being consumed by other biology. So you, you've turned them into a bio stimulant, which is basically what happens to thermo fights in a meso fillic phase.

Um, they're being consumed by other bacteria and protozoa and, and converted into, um, a what we call a biotic bank account. Like it's there. Um, and it will be available when, uh, the time is appropriate for, for the next level of bacteria to be consumed, um, and released in plant available form. So you're, you're basically like banking a bio stimulant in, in a situation like that, but you're not, you're not producing, um, biological compost per se, if I was clear on that. Mm-hmm. .

Mm-hmm. . So, so, um, this, this, this compost that we're talking about that is finished and it is stable, um, how are we going to, um, you know, we can use that in, in, in all the ways that we normally think about compost at this point, right? As a correct, as a top dress, as a soil amendment, all that kind of stuff. Mm-hmm. . Exactly.

So unlike the other ones that we've talked about so far that have got limitations because they've never become stable, This is the first one in the list where we can feel pretty safe doing whatever we want with it. Yep. And again, test it, you know, stick your hand in it, pile it up, and, and, and feel if it starts to heat up again, if it, if it heats up, um, then you're still in what we would consider decomposition phase,

thermo fillic phase. Um, but if it doesn't heat up or you stick your hand in there and it, it feels a little cool to you, then you, you know, you've got a, um, stable, um, organic matter. All right. Cool. And we, we have to introduce that at some point in the near future as to, instead of calling it compost, we need to call it, um, like those terms that I've talked to you about, like ground up, organic matter, gum, uh, palm particular organic matter, or moan, mineral associated organic matter.

Cause now you're getting into that point where it's, it's, it's in a phase of decomposition. So everything starts with, with, um, soil and plant growing and then breaks back down into soil eventually. Yeah. We need a, uh, especially since you pointed out the beginning of that, compost is really a process and not a product. We really need new vocabulary words for these various products that we're talking about because people say, Oh, my compost, your compost.

And really people are comparing very different things because they're, they're not all at the same, um, maturity status. Dude, we did a compost cup out here a year ago, the Ventura County Compost Cup. We brought in all of the local compost producers, uh, everything from, you know, the family gardener to, uh, you know, these big companies that make it. And you know, these, you know, experts, these, these are heavy hitters that came. Um, we had 10 judges. Uh, one was a,

uh, soil scientist from Rodale. Others were, were business owners who produced large scale amount volumes of compost, um, all the way down to, uh, guys that, that make what I would consider, uh, moan, uh, mineral or associated organic matter. Um, and, and we put 'em all out on a table. And I spent three days prior to this, uh, micro scoping every sample to see which ones were would, would I consider biologically, um, inoculant.

And so we had these 10 judges. Uh, I was not one of 'em cuz I was biased cuz I already looked at everything. , uh, and we had them analyze it and vote on, you know, each category. We had verma compost, we had food waste compost, we had, uh, thermo fillic compost, we had, uh, static compost, we had yard waste and you name it, horse, horse manure compost. And each one of them, um, looked at the samples and then voted based on appearance. Only one person out of those 10 judges actually sniffed it.

And that was the soil scientist. And then when it was all done and they all voted, um, at the end of the competition, I stood up and I said, Hey, you know, I really appreciate you guys taking the time to come out here and do this, but I wanna point out something that, um, you guys basically determined the value of the compost on appearance only. And everyone kind of looked around at each other like, Oh fuck, you know how he's right. How, how are we qualifying or quantifying why this one's better

than that one by appearance? So I point out, hey, we did no testing, so we have no idea which one's nutritional and which one's not. Um, we don't know which ones could potentially have high salt or, or heavy metals like the horse manure compost. Um, very common to have high aluminum in in horse manure as well as high salts

sodiums. Um, both detrimental to plants. Um, and, and also I biologically scoped all of these, but that wasn't even taken into consideration as to, uh, again, stating that this was better than the other ones in that category. And it was extremely eyeopening, like that conversation that the room just exploded inside conversations at that point, everybody was like, Oh my God, I never thought about it that way. Mm-hmm.

. And so it was really eye opening to basically put that level of, of experience in a room together and, and turn them on their heads because they basically had no real evidence to determine which was better, uh, than the other ones except for visually. . All right. So let's go to our next category. So the next one, um, uh, I kind of just put it in its own category because I really just thought that, um, um, worm castings were just like a,

a a part of all compost and that was it. Um, but then, um, uh, folks might recall, uh, uh, Chandler from, uh, uh, from Worm's who was on the show a couple episodes ago, uh, talking about worms and, um, like he was kind enough to send me out a bag of, uh, the worm Verma compost that they make so that I could see what a Verma compost was like. And dude, it's, it's unlike anything else that I would call compost. Um, um, it is, uh, it's, it's, uh, uh, it,

its smaller. Um, it's smells sweet. It is, it, it seems more uniform, It seems a little bit heavier. Um, uh, you know, when the, when you know, again, something that's called compost, right? But really, um, you were talking about the pass through, um, uh, worm bins earlier, that stuff that comes out at the bottom, which is the, the worms, um, the worm casting. So they're poop with, um, you know, whatever kind of like soil or hay that might have been thrown in there to kind

of even it out and make it a pleasant living environment, I guess. Um, that stuff while called compost is really its own thing. And, um, and so let's talk about that itself. So, so, you know, you get a, uh, you know, somebody gives you verma compost and, and it's, you know, vastly worm castings. Um, let's, let's talk about what, what the, the attributes of that compost would be. Okay, that's great. Um, so when you are, um, doing verma compost at scale, um,

you have to start with betting, right? Everybody, you can't just throw food in a bin and throw some worms in there because they won't survive. The whole thing will go in aerobic and, and the worms will turn to slime. So you need to create a be that the worms can, uh, retreat to, um, to do the air thing, whether it's breed or, or rest. Um, and then, uh, an area for them to work through, um, to get their food. Um, they don't wanna live in decomposing food.

They wanna live in their be, but they wanna be able to eat. So think of it that way. All right. So, um, and again, thank you for, for observing the weight of it because that's really, really important to understand. That's why Verma compost is so unlike other forms of compost, because it's pushing on the moham mineral associated organic matter side.

So mineral associated organic matter is highly stable, long term in soil and provides great benefit to, um, helping the, the, the soil food web to begin to build aggregates micro and macro aggregates, which is important for soil health. But I'm not gonna go down there. So why is ver compost so much different? Well, those worms have chewed through that material consuming bacteria and pooping out, um, nutrient, highly nutrient dense little poops,

because they're really there to eat the biology. They, they don't really want to eat the, the nutrients per se. Um, they, they will try, they will help move those nutrients throughout the entire, uh, worm bed. Um, which is, again, mutually beneficial because now you're getting an even, um, even amount of nutrients throughout the entire system. It's not like this pocket's gonna be heavily laden with, with this nutrient or that mineral. It's been pushed through the whole system.

So yeah, worm castings are very special because they are, uh, very nutrient dense and highly biologically available. In other words, if you put those arm castings into or top dress and then apply a, a really good compost extract, a biologically rich compost extract ort, um, those, those things will be broken down extremely fast and stored in the biology so that they're not mobile. And again, this is really important to understand nutrients.

If you just take raw nutrient like a secondary tertiary metaly, and you put it on the soil and it rains, that stuff's gone, it's gonna get washed through and down into the lower soil systems where it's no longer going to be as available, um, for the plants. So you've, you've, you've gone backwards, you've lost your minerals, you've lost your nutrients.

So that's why it's so important to have that biology on, on high numbers so that they can consume those secondary and tertiary met lights, store them in their biota in their body so that now when it rains, um, they're stuck to their biofilm. That stuff's not going anywhere. The only time that stuff that nutrient in, in that bacteria is going to go somewhere is when that bacteria is consumed by a protozoa or stared to death by a, uh, lack of exit date and becomes available to the plant.

So that's why Worm castings are just so special, is because they are basically secondary and tertiary lytes ready to be consumed by a biology, which will then store it as a, uh, a nutrient bank system for when the plant wants them. Special stuff. Yeah, it totally special stuff. And, and, um, you know, I copped this, you know, when when we did the, uh, you know, uh, you know, making friends with Worm episodes like, I don't know, three or four back with,

uh, with Chandler, Um, and like, I'm honestly new to worms. Like I, I like worms, I make sure that I've got worms in my pots, but, but mostly I would just have always thought about them aerating the soil and, and, but it wasn't until, you know, talked with Chandler that I realized that they are these like super efficient processing machines, biological machines that are just taking these, um, this biology that's not super accessible to us or our plans and running it

through their bodies and pooping out the other end something that is rich and valuable to us. And this is, that's pretty badass. Yeah, it is. Yeah, it is. All right. So let's go to the, the fifth category now. Um, we're down to our last two here. So the fifth one, it, it kind of, I'm not sure if it totally fits in this, in this group, but, um, since this is where, um, my curiosity started, uh,

for this episode today, uh, I definitely want to include it. So, um, for the last, I don't know, five or six years, um, I have been using, um, uh, both of the, the compost team making products from Green Bicycles. Um, and, uh, uh, Kevin Jory turned me onto this stuff one day when I was visiting Wonderland Nursery because Patrick, the founder of Green Bicycles had come by and he had, you know, this huge 35 gallon, uh, container of this,

this, this, uh, what looked like powder. And Kevin says, you know, I swear by this stuff, it makes great composes. You should, you should try it. And so I have, and I loved it.

I got great results and I've been using it for years. Um, and so, so the stuff from Green Bicycles though, is very unlike the other stuff that we've talked about so far today because, um, the Green Bicycles products is, is not like, uh, food refuges or, or, um, um, you know, lawn clippings or, or cuttings from my cannabis plans. It is a blend of what I think of more as soil amendments,

right? So there's, you know, there's, there, there's guano and feather meal and crab shell, and you know, the kinds of stuff that, that we all in the regenerative scene, um, are known to use to build our soil. And, and so, um, he's got two versions of the product, uh, one of it with, um, molasses that's dried in there and then, and then one that's not, and the, the one without the molasses is kind of seen more as a soil amendment. And the one with molasses is, is, um,

is used more as a compost tea. And so, um, so I've been using this stuff for years, but it wasn't until again, I started following, um, uh, um, you know, the, the worms, uh, Instagram and Chandler's Instagram, uh, uh, I think it's jet Gardens, um, that I, that I really started realizing that the stuff I was making compost tea quotes out of, um, was not, it didn't look like compost to me anymore. It was, it was a,

a bunch of amendments with molasses. And so I, I would always like take that and put that in my, um, my bubbler that I got from T lab and, um, in a bubble up. And it makes this like beautiful compost tea that smells great and, and my plants have have done well on it. But, but, but, um, I, I'm like, where, where's the biology part of it? And is this its own category, which I have just started calling a nutrient tea, which that category may or may not exist, but like I'm on my own path, right?

I just came across it my own and everybody else probably already knows about this. So, so I've been using this and so, so a I know it works. B I love the ingredients. Um, but c I don't know if bubbling it is actually doing me any good because there, I, I don't think that there's any living biology, but there's gotta be biology that is ced up, that was, you know, on the feather meal, on the crab shell, you know, contained in the back guano. So, so there's like, like,

there's like ced up sleeping biology in there, I'm guessing. Um, and then I go ahead and, you know, fire it up, and then I get nutrition with, I'm guessing some amount of biology. So, so please speak to that, which, which is a very different, it's a very different product to put in, in the same bucket of as compost, but I really feel like it's got its own personality and I, and I don't know how to resolve it with the rest of this stuff.

, Oh, it definitely has a personality and I, I, I appreciate the, the, the term nutrient, um, solution or, or nutrient tea, um, would be the appropriate way to describe it. Um, the big difference between compost extract and teas versus a nutrient, um, tea would be the lack of humic acid. Mm, the lack of folic acids. Um, those are, um, biological super foods.

So basically it's like, uh, one stop shop for, for your entire soil, food web by using, um, you know, these, these compost extracts that are very high in hemic or folic assets. So that being said, now we've, we've separated these two by that one critical ingredient. Now let's talk about the two different varieties. One with molasses, one without molasses, I would tend to believe the one with molasses would be working a lot quicker.

So a short term, whereas the one without molasses would be more of a long term, um, nutrient tea. And by that I mean that when you apply that nutrient solution onto the soil, um, you're, you're assuming that that solution is going to be absorbed by the existing organic matter, um, and then slowly released by, uh, the bacteria that are mining it and storing it in themselves, and then they become available to the protozone, which pooped out to the plant,

et cetera. So one is a short term, one is long term. The short term one with the molasses is going to stimulate all kinds of microbial activity. Um, we know for sure that, that the bacteria just love molasses. Um, there was, I I, years ago, I, it got explained to me, and I forget what it is, but it has something to do with the fact that the sugar has only been processed

to a certain point. Um, it hasn't been refined yet, and that's why the bacteria love it so much because there's, again, the secondary tertiary lytes haven't been refined to a point where that they're more difficult to break down. So you're gonna have biofilms built up on all of those,

uh, nutrient inputs. So, um, just recently nasa, uh, came back with an article about how they had slapped some biofilm on the outside of the space station at three years ago, and they scraped it this year and brought it inside, and yes, it was still live even though it had been living in space, which is,

you know, how could anything live in space, Right? Well, it goes to show that that biology is, is incredibly resilient, but it also goes to show that the biofilm is so powerful that it can protect those organisms pretty much in any con in any environment you can possibly come up with. Um, at some point, I, I tend to believe that we will find, um, that perhaps life even exists in flames, uh, wow. That there's some kind of biology that we haven't quite uncovered yet. Um,

but that's a whole nother story. Yeah. That, that sounds like a whole different meaning for the shaping Fire podcast name, right? , right . We'll get there someday, hopefully. Yeah. But, um, anyway, to stay,

stay on top here. Um, so that being said, that yes, when you, when you add the dry molasses and you put it in water and you bubble it, you, you're, you're going to, um, get a, uh, bacterial explosion, a plume for lack of better words, and you're gonna be pluming out the organisms that were consuming that had, had, had created their biofilm and, and their protection, their home on those individual, um, nutrients, whether it's crab, meal, horse, uh, uh, whatever, uh, feather meal,

crab meal, calcium, whatever it is, But they will have bacteria specifically mine, those components, and now you've grown them out. So guess what? When you pour them on your soil, you're gonna have an explosion of, of the biology that has that nutrient stored up in its pantry that is now going to be consumed by the ProTool and nematodes that you have present in your soil system or, or the, or the micro orthopods. Just not forget about them. Um, and the worms don't forget about them,

right? Cause they're all working together to release this nutrients, um, back to the plant. And so, um, that's, that's what I would say to, to this, uh, green bicycle, uh, nutrient solution is that it's, it's an amendment, but yes, it does have some, um, biological constituents that are available on those nutrients that mine those specific nutrients. So very targeted biology. Right. On. Cool. And, you know, uh, I, I started with it just because, you know, Kevin Jory said so right?

And I trusted his opinion and it's worked for me for years. And it's, it's funny that now like whatever, five, six years ago, you know, later now I'm really getting to the point that I can even think about more what it is. Um, so I'm, you know, it, it works for me even without knowing exactly what it is. So, um, so I like that kind of product. I wanna, I want to clean up, before we go on to the next topic,

I wanna clean up a couple of the things that I got wrong. Uh, um, so Worms Instagram is obviously easy cause you know how to spell worms, but, but, um, Chandler Alki who was a guest for the, for the, you know, getting friendly with Worms shaping fire episode like three back, uh, I got his Instagram wrong. I looked it up real quick. It's actually Jet House Gardens. And so nothing worse than you plug somebody whose Instagram is very educational for you and then you plug it wrong, you know?

Oh, I didn't want to interrupt you, but I was going to clarify that. Right? I'm glad you did. I'm glad. You did. Fresh right on. Cool. Yeah, so I wanna, you know, I wanted do Chandler solid, so I wanted to clean that up. And then, um, and then anybody who is interested in looking at that Green Bicycle's products, um, uh, it's kind of weird cuz Green is actually spelled G R e a N. And so that's, that's, you know,

that's trick and Will totally destroy your Google results without it. And the, the, the two products that, I mean, it's their only two products, but it's the two ones that I've used all these years is the Happy Endings Compost T Mix, and the Ocean Bounty flowering mix. So, um, for, for anybody who wants to look into that, and you can get that stuff on Amazon and their website. So, all right,

so moving right along. So, so we're coming up here to the end of this, like huge first set and, and, and the, the compost we're gonna talk about next. Number six, this is actually gonna set us up for set two because we're gonna talk about this variety of compost, um, during most of probably all of set two. So, so, um, so just, just set us up there, Layton, and then, and then I'll take us to commercial. So the sixth category is the stuff that you sent me, man.

Like, like I had a problem in my, you know, I, I know you're a compost expert. You consult for all these people. You got this crazy ass lab in your, in your garage, and another one in Connecticut. Like, like I know you were like mad scientist, compost guy, but like, I had not actually ever seen like what you make, right? Like, I've always, I've always appreciated you for our, our friendship and conversation. But I,

but I, I, you know, I never seen any of your compost. And so, um, so I had a fungus snap problem, which we'll talk more about in the third set, but you're like, Hey man, let me, let me send you something to fix that. And, and you, you shipped me up, um, um, uh, two different bags of this compost, which was unlike any other compost that I had ever come across. Um, it was, you know, small granular, and it was rich and it smelled so good. I wanted to eat it.

And it, it, like, I mean, not to sound too woo woo, I, I feel like I felt it alive. I felt like I was getting vibes off of it. Like when I opened it, like I was, you know, I got like a hit of the smell and I'm like, Whoa, what is this? This is very unlike anything else that I have been given as

compost. And then, um, you know, you told me to just, uh, you know, um, uh, I think you had me brew it and, and then, and then I put it, put it on, and it caused all of this like, immediate biological change, which we're gonna talk about more in set two. But this, after talking to you with talking to you more about it, um, you explained to me why this kind of compost is in a category all of its own. So, so please explain what's different about this cat,

this category of compost that I had never even considered. And, and then, so like, set us up and then, and then I'll take us to commercial. Okay. So we'll get into the process in the next set, but bottom line is it's a biological inoculate. Um, the foundation of it is palm, so particulate or organic matter. So you, you notice that really fine particulate mm-hmm. , but you also noticed it was super fluffy. And that's the key to this, uh,

that fluffiness allows for gas exchange. Um, it allows the, for heavy colonization of, of, you know, very, very diverse biology, um, in a way that, um, does not force competition. So ev not everybody's fighting for the same resource. They're just there in suspension, um, just to be woken up and, and by you, uh, whether you're brewing them or top dressing with them.

Um, so basically it's, look at it like condominiums I'm building, you know, every one of those tiny little particulate is a giant condominium, a city full of all different types of biology, um, that are there. Um, basically just waiting to be, um, provided with the environment that they can really, um, you know, expand in and, and thrive in. So that's why that's different. And we'll get into the ingredients in the process, uh, in the next set.

Hit hit the hit hit the key thing for me though, which is, um, the fact that it's, it's not a thermal compost. Now. It is not. And, and in most ways it would be considered, uh, immature. And the reason, um, it would be considered immature is because when I take this start product, which is the, the biological compost that I made, uh, non thermo fillic, we call it cold composting. Um, I screen it,

uh, numerous times. Um, so I'm screening out the big stuff. Um, I'm using forces to break off all of the organisms, the human folic acids, um, to break down the little pieces that are, tend to be clumped together or sheared off of a bigger piece of organic matter.

So it's those mechanical processes and then the screening that allows me to get that poem, those fine little particulates, um, and suspend them in a solution so that they can be colonized by all the different diverse bacteria and biology that I've put into play. And this idea that it's a cold compost, I haven't heard that term before.

I like it. Um, you know, you, when we talked about this earlier in the week, it was interesting cuz you said, you know, all of the other compost, all right, probably not the vermaculture, but, but most of the other compost that we have talked about today, they have all been heated to like, what, 1 65 or something, because mm-hmm. because people are trying to, you know, kill the seeds and,

you know, make it, make it a little more inert. Um, but, but really that's also killing all the microbes, which is really what, what so many of us, uh, natural farmers are chasing after. And it really astonished me that, you know, to realize that I'm always thinking about, um, using my compost teas because I wanna pour microbes into my soil

to help buoy the rise oe. But really, um, if it's a thermal compost, it means that like, that stuff's like mostly been wiped out already versus this cold compost where even though we'll talk more about this in a second, it sounds like it's dangerous because it's all like wild in there. Like what I imagine I'm doing with a thermal compost tea really is happening at a much smaller level than if I were to use a cold compost tea.

Correct. And the one thing you're missing too, is the most important reason to go thermal fillic is to kill pathogens. Oh, all right. So they kill weed seeds. Yes. Um, that's a, a byproduct of, of the process. But the goal is to, um, knock back all of the potential pathogens. Uh, remember a lot of, a lot of compost is based on manures, right? High end, um, anaerobic digestion, which is the other piece that we did talk about. Um, but the Thermo Fillic component is to basically,

uh, provide the same thing as an anaerobic digestion. You're killing everything. Um, and then starting over, starting fresh. And so, yeah, that's, that's why I went to, um, cold composting was because I could not get the, the biological, um, diversity that I was looking for when I went thermophilic. But again, I don't use any manures, I don't use any food waste. I use purely vegan compost. So this is just plants. All right. So we will dig into that, uh, even more, uh, for set two.

And, uh, and if you're still with us, uh, uh, I appreciate you. This is, this is a solid hour first set, which is the longest first set I've ever had. Um, but, um, I care very much about this topic and, um, and there's no way that I wanted to do this topic short shift, right? Like, if we're gonna do it, let's fricking do it. And, and so if you're still here with us and you're caring about all this,

like you're our kind of people, and I really appreciate that you're here. So, um, we're gonna go ahead and take a short break and be right back. You're listening to Shaping Fire, and my guest today is Soil Biologist Layton Morrison. And, you know, without these advertisers shaping Fire would not happen. So please do support them and let you let them know you heard about them Un shaping Fire.

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you can also check their Instagram at COT Canada. You know, getting away from pesticides is good for health and good for business, and COT is ready to help. Visit copt.com today. Welcome back. You are listening to Shaping Fire, and I am your host sh Golos. And my guest today is Soil Biologist Layton Morrison. So here we are at set two. During set one, we looked at a wide variety of the things that we come in contact with that

is labeled compost. And we did our best to make sense of them, and we found ourself at the end with, um, you know, focusing on the kind of compost that that I think that I'm usually looking

for. Um, you know, you know much of the other types, the, you know, the curated compost and the vermaculture compost and the nutrient compost, like, like all of that stuff is, are things that I use in my garden, But most of the time, myself as a natural farmer interested in regenerative, um, you know, cultivation and feeding the R oe, um, I'm really wanting to, you know, feed and add microbe life. I want to add biology. And, um, and, and so we, we ended the first set talking about,

um, cold compost that have not been heated. We, that where all the biology is still alive. And so in this set, we're gonna talk, um, a bit about the difference, um, between that and the, and the other composts and the biology. And also I'm very interested in, um, you know, if, if one of the reasons we heat thermal compost is get rid of the pathogens that makes this unheated microbe inoculate this cold compost sound like wild, like wild ways. So, so, so, so let, let's just start, um,

with the difference. You know, you, you have spoken on this, on this show before, uh, uh, briefly about the difference between soil science and soil biology. And, um, you know, I, I, my, you know, back of the envelope is just like soil sciences, nutrition and minerals, and soil biology is living stuff. But, but honestly, we haven't gone into, you know, in depth so far. So I could, I could have it wrong. So, so why don't we start there and then we can start to hang the rest of the

conversation on that. Um, Layton. All right, that sounds good. And, you know, thank you again, Shango for doing this because you we're, we're having a conversation that has needed to happen for many years now about, you know, whether it's a compost is should be called compost, or whether it's needs other names. And I, and you know, just recently in the last couple years, I've seen, you know, like particular organic matter and mineral associate organic matter come

about as, as words that are provide value. Um, and, and this next part, which is also equally as important is, is the understanding that soil is actually three components. It is the physical sand, so clay and organic matter and their relationship, which is very important. Second is soil chemistry, and third is soil biology, soil science base, everything on two of those three pieces, which is the physical and the chemical. And this is due to, um, economic based systems. And.

Like, and like human reductionism, right? We always, we always value life last, right? Seems to be the way should I go really seems to be the way, especially if you look at where we are as a species at this point in time. . . We won't go there, all right? But basically, soil science is, is chemistry heavy. Um, everything has been based on building fertilizers to grow more crops, to feed more people, regardless of nutritional value,

which makes no sense to me. Um, the only real way to at achieve nutrient dense food is through biology. It's that critical, uh, biogeochemical interactions that allow that plant to pull up these nutrients, um, and, and, and regulate itself as to what it wants instead of being force fed, um, and pk. So that is why there's this huge disconnect in soil

science versus soil biology. Um, until Dr. Lane Ingham made the world aware that there is life under their feet, uh, people didn't even consider soil biology as, as a real thing. And so in many ways, she's pioneered the eye opening of, of the masses to the fact that there is more, uh, going on in the soil than just physical and chemical. Um, that there's this critical bridge called biological, uh, that allows the chemistry to flow in and out of the

physical components and into the plant directly. So that's, that's an important conversation needs to happen, is that, you know, the soil science world has got to, uh, knock down the ivory towers of just chemistry and really start to open up to this, uh, interdisciplinary, uh, mode of operation, um, that will unlock these really important,

um, secrets. I sent you a paper recently, which I, I'm sure you're gonna enjoy reading time and time again, because there's just so much information in that, um, that basically kind of explains that this, this organic matter, we're not gonna call it compost anymore. It's organic matter. It's just in different phases of decomposition. Um, provide this incredibly powerful, um, home, um, city, uh, globe cons, consider it a planet that, that aggregate is a planet.

And inside that planet is all of this magic that's going on, that that's protecting itself. It, it's evolving. Um, it's, it's producing, uh, more inoculate for, for more expansion, for, for better soil structure to, to accept moisture. The more moisture that goes in that gets held in those aggregates, the more densely populated they can become, the more they can clean the water,

the more they can provide foods for other organisms. So it's really the, the foundation of everything is that bio geochemical processes that are occurring within, inside that aggregate. Now, is that aggregate, uh, poem or mo Well, , that's the thing is when you get into mineral associated organic matter, you get into a environment where you're compacted. Now you're, you're, you don't have the gas or air exchange, I should say. Um, you don't have the CO2 leaving and the oxygen or the, the air,

atmospheric air coming down. You don't have the, the same, um, ability to, to aggregate. Um, that's why it's so much more stable than poem. Um, so I'm sorry I got way off track there, but I think, I think that's important to really differentiate the difference between, um, these phases of, of decomposition. Sure. I'll bring you back in. Uh, but, but since you mentioned the paper that you sent me yesterday, we might as well plug it and, um, uh, I will also have a link to it on the, uh,

page for this episode on the Shaping Fire website. Um, but the, but the, but the, the, the, the science paper, which was a fantastic read last night, is called Will Fungi Solve the Carbon Dilemma, and it's by, uh, s Amelia Ula and Ellie Morian. Um, anyway, it's, it's, it's a fascinating read and, um, um, and we'll be talking more about the, the, the fungal aspects of this paper,

you know, towards, towards the latter half of this set. But, um, what you're saying, Layton is, is spelled out very specifically. Uh, they're talking about having an increase in soil biology, especially with fungal heavy compost, um, creating all of these soil opportunities that are not available to the soil when not using biologically and funnily active, um, agricultural soils. So, so anyway, that's, that's the paper. And so, we'll,

we'll get back on topic here. So, um, so we are talking about the difference between, uh, the soil science and the soil biology and, uh, and how most of, uh, most of compost and, and everything is looking at the, at the chemistry and the physicality of the soil and not the biology. Um, I would like you to, uh, speak to this idea of the, the, um, the, the, the, the variety of biology, right?

Because NPK is so reductionist, and, and, and most of us in cannabis were, were brought up thinking, you know, hit our NPK numbers, feed the plant, or, you know, if we came from the bottle, forced feed the plant. And, and, and, and what we are trying to tease out is that, um, you know, the compost, which is, is, is the central, the, the focus of our topic. We want it to be as biologically active as possible. And, and the way for us to do that is to not cook it like a thermal

compost. So, I, I would like you to speak to what that, uh, process is like to produce a compost that has not been cooked. Because creating a cooked thermal compost is the only thing that I've ever heard of. So, again, let's not call it compost, let's call it organic matter. Fair enough. All right. And organic matter is probably the largest, uh, source of nutritional holding capacity. All right? This is where biology meets chemistry.

So most people understand what a catine exchange site is, or cat exchange capacity. So that capacity is the ability for nutrient solution to be held on the bond site so that it's not mobile and therefore safe and secure for later harvest by the plant and the biology. All right? So that's, that's really important to understand.

Um, so that being said, uh, trying to reel it back into understanding the fillic process of breaking down organic matter, um, I think that, um, the best, the best way to approach it is, is to understand that when you get over 120 degrees, um, you are learn losing biological diversity. When you hit 130 degrees, you have lost pretty much everything. It's now just thermal fights that are living in that organic matter

or on that organic matter, I should say. Um, so that's why if you are goal is to achieve a biological compost,

you have to be below 120 degrees. Now, back in the day when I was studying under lane, there was always this issue of, well, you know, you can bring in pathogens and you can cause, you know, plant problems, uh, you know, deficiencies and, and all of these other things because you've brought something in from somewhere else, and you've applied it, uh, perhaps inappropriately, um, onto, uh, into this pod or onto this plant.

And my argument's always been that, um, diversity will out compete, um, reductionist. So if I've reduced this down to just thermal fights, the potential for a pathogenic outbreak is way greater than if I had a very biologically diverse compost system. Um, this was one of, of many conversations that Elaine and I agreed to disagree about, was the fact that for her, um, she has a,

an incredible reputation, a celebrity status. Um, so she has to be very guarded about what she says because people will inappropriately, uh, be morons and, and use more, uh, because a little is good. Oh, more is better. Well, that's how you get into these problems with pathogen, uh, cross-contamination, um, with deficient nutrient deficient issues. Um, because what happens is you, you've created a nut log or you've created a pathogenic inoculation.

So that's why it's critical that, that she maintains that the only way to make safe compost is to do it. Theil and I, and I agree with her, because humans are just humans. They, they tend to do stuff without really thinking first. And, and, you know, making sure that they are, um, crossing the ts and dotting the eyes, uh, responsibly. Um, it tends to be, Oh, whatever's easy and quickest for me is what I'm gonna do.

And that's not the appropriate approach when you're dealing with, um, these critical types of, uh, biological exposures. Um, there's, there's some compost that I've made that are, are definitely, uh, potentially very dangerous to play with, because if I have underlying health issues and I'm playing with pseudomona bacteria, the potential for me to actually make myself very sick is, is,

is real. Um, I think that in many ways I've, I've benefited from my work playing with anaerobic, um, fish manure, um, because I, early on was getting exposed to this stuff. And like you said earlier, if you get that stuff on you, it, it's days before you don't stink anymore. So there's, there's, you know, some serious issues to it. And,

but I learned very quickly, um, I never got violently sick. Um, I definitely, uh, you know, had some stomach issues, you know, early on when I was playing with this stuff because I didn't completely understand, um, about the difference between anaerobic digestion and, and aerobic, um, aerobic microbes, um, versus anaerobic microbes and, and the potential for, uh, them to make us very sick. So that being said, um, let's, let's delve into what is a cold compost versus a thermo fillic, um,

in a cold composting situation. Um, the sweet spot for massive proto of production, and the reason I'm using proto is because they're the ones that are doing all of, or the vast majority of nutrient cycling. In other words, the nutrient cycling is that this bacteria has all this good stuff locked up in it, including nitrogen. And this proso wants to eat that bacteria cuz it wants the carbon to make itself

grow and get bigger. Doesn't want the nitrogen, doesn't care about what's in the pantry of that bacteria. So it consumes that and it poops out pure nitrogen and all of these other elements in a plant available form. And that's critical. Um, in pretty much all soil systems that I look at, the number one issue is the lack of protozoa. That would be the flags and the miba. Those are the aerobic ones. The AIC ones are the silts, and then you get some fas,

which we're not gonna get into that, it's just too deep. But bottom line is, the sweet spot is 85 degrees and 70%, uh, moisture content. So when you squeeze the stuff, you will get water drops forming in between your fingers. That tells you that it's above 50% if you get no moisture or you're about 50% if you get drops, now you're pushing into the 60, 70 and 80% moisture. That's the sweet spot for,

for protosome and production. Um, it is also generally, uh, a sweet spot for what I want to call fungal spoilation and germination. Um, in the soil system itself, um, plants don't like it, Uh, that humid or that that high moisture, that's when you get into root ros and you get into, um, other disease causing, uh, potential pathogens. Whereas in a compost pile, it's a different animal. Now, we're not dealing with plant life yet.

We're just dealing with protosome and production. And when I'm applying, um, this, well, I probably need to go through the process of, of how I do it. So I'm, I'm, I'm taking these vegan, um, composts. So it's just plants, no manures, greens, and browns. Uh, the ratio is, is always 66% browns, 30, uh, three and a half percent greens. Um, and you are using a tremendous amount of water to, to get that, to begin what I call the thermo fillic rise.

We never want to get to the theil process. That's 130. We've gotta keep it below one 20. I generally tell people, keep it below one 15. If I get to one 15, I gotta flip it. As a matter of fact, I gotta flip a pile this afternoon because I'm at one 15 right now. That being said, uh, let the temperature go up to a certain point. Uh, one 15 is max, and then I flip it. If it doesn't get to one 15, then I never flip it. Um, I just let it do its thing and I watch it until it starts to come down.

Not quite to ambient. Ambient would be the, the temperature outside environment. So today it's 75 is always and sunny. So when it's 75 degrees, and I know it's gone through the biological process or the thermo fillic rise, that that never got to thermo fillic phase. Um, so I, I brought it up, but I kept it in the meso fillic. Now that's considered immature compost because it's not really well broken down. So how do I break it down at that point? Well,

that's where I get into these mechanical forces. I use agitation, aeration, vibration, uh, spin, so gravity, um, all of these things to, to get that immature compost to harvest the, the things that I'm looking for, which is the biology and, and the smallest bits poem, particulate organic matter that I can get through that process. And then whatever's left, goes right back into the compost pile again.

So it continues to break down. So are, are you describing mechanical processes that you, um, uh, submit the. Immature compost. The immature organic material to, um, that replaces what is normally done by breaking down with thermals. Or, or time, or time? Cause again, right? You can, you can stack up a, a pile ships, uh, or, or any organic matter for that matter, any organic matter for that matter. And it will go through a decom decomposition phase.

Um, whether it gets hot, whether it goes thermo fillic or not. It, it doesn't matter. I mean, I don't know about you, but growing up in New England, we had to rake leaves every fall. And we would take those leaves and dump 'em over at the edge of the swamp, and that pile would be like five feet tall, and me and my sisters would jump in it. We'd have a blast throwing theses and, you know, running down the hill and fast as we can, trying to dive into the pile mm-hmm. . But come spring,

that pile was gone. It was just this low lump of, of what was left of, we call it leaf mold nowadays, but just what was left of all those leaves. So that went through a breakdown process, but it never got hot. It never, we never saw those piles steaming. So there was no major heat exchange, but there was definitely some minor heat exchange in order for that to break down. When you add the water, the, um, the, the 85 degrees and 70% moisture, that's a, that's a lot of moisture.

Um, uh, is the water involved because it's there to keep the temperature from spiking, I think you called it a thermo fillic rise. I'm not very familiar with that. I'd like to know what happens during the thermo fillic rise and what's, what, what's ha like, why, why so much water? So the water, um, is broken into H two O, right? So we have oxygen and we have hydrogen. There are a lot of, uh, bacterial constituents that, that thrive on hydrogen.

So they consume hydrogen as a fuel source to break apart the nitrogen and the organic matter, or the carbon off of the organic matter. All right? So there are also other forms of bacteria that consume the oxygen to do their part in breaking the nitrogen and the carbon off of each other. Does that make sense? Yeah, it does. So water's the food, water's life, right? There's no joke to that. Water is life without it, and nothing ceases to exist.

So that water is just a fuel source. It has nothing to do with, with, with regulating temperatures. Not, we're not putting out the fire, we're just providing a food source for the biology to do their part in breaking the nitrogen and the carbon off of each other. Mm-hmm. . And so, um, uh, let's see.

I'm gonna try to do a summarization to this point. So, so what we're trying to do with the cold compost is that, um, we are going to a use only plant matter, so we don't have to worry as much about pathogens like e coli. And then we're not gonna let the temperature go above 85 degrees, but especially one 20. But 85 is really our, our goal, um, so that the, the, the pile, um, gets warm naturally from the breaking down, but it doesn't get hot enough to kill our microbes off.

And we can get away with that because we're only using plant material instead of, um, animal material, which can cause the pathogens. And, and then we are also going to do, uh, mechanical processes to this organic material that will further break it down, uh, to create more of these biological opportunities in the soil for life. Um, which also, uh, breaks down the compost in ways, some of the, some of the ways that we would get from a thermal version as well.

So we're, we're choosing to not use the heat of a thermal fillic compost, and instead we are using, um, a safer inputs and also massaging the soil in ways that opens up opportunities. And so we have what is essentially yes, a riskier, or I love what you said earlier, a dangerous compost. Um, but we have decreased that risk by not using animal products in there. And we are making it more diverse and more effective by doing some of these mechanical preparations too.

Yes. And I think, think the other thing is that you missed is seeds, right? When I, when I harvest greens and browns and I harvest greens and browns, um, I don't harvest plants that have gone to seed, cuz I don't want the seed in my compost. What I want is flowers, but I don't want the seed pots. So that's another piece to this that's important. And the other one, which is we're missing on is diversity. Like, I, I collect like every type of green I can find,

every type of brown I can find. Um, and then I use those proportionally, uh, volume not by weight to make my pile. And the reason it's so important to get the diversity is because of endophytic biology. It's a little bit deep, but we gotta go there. All right. So the endophytes that live inside those green leaves, and in. The browns, we just did the Jeff Lowen Fell's Show on, uh, bacterial endo fight. So anybody who just listened to that show is already gonna be up to speed on

this. So, so folks who want to hear more about this, go back and listen to the show about the new Jeff Lowen Fell's book with that, please continue. All right. So, but there's both endophytic bacteria and there's endophytic fungi that live inside the plant itself. So when that leaf, um, is fall comes, and it, it dries out and falls the ground, if it lands on the ground, it's going to release. Um, sapes, uh, this is the type of fungi that decomposes organic matter,

but it's also gonna release decomposing bacteria. Um, say it lands in the water well, it's now going to become aquatic microorganisms. Now you've heard me talk about the great mass migrations, uh, before the great human expansions. And this, here, again, is, was subject that is, um, somewhat debating or debatable that, that there is microbes that live can live both terrestrial and aquatic. I'm a firm believer of it, but there's plenty of people out there that would say, I'm, I'm bad.

Shit crazy on this. But that being said, I have proven it, uh, to myself many, many times in the products that I've done. Um, one of the key things that I've focus on is diatoms. Um, those are, uh, specific organism that lives generally speaking in aquatic environments, and it produces, or they produce oxygen via two different sources.

, that's why they're so powerful. One is through photosynthesis, and the other is through, um, consuming biology, consuming bacteria, consuming nutrients that are, are, are in the water system, and then using their own internal, um, biological factories to take that nutrient out of the water and build their shells and build, build their, uh, or I should say, divide and continue to expand as a population. So I've applied, I've applied diatom based, um,

well, it's one of my ingredients. It's called fish brew, for lack of better ways. You just, let's get right after it. So fish brew, uh, the, the farm on Cape Cod has fresh water diatoms like I've never seen before. And I got so excited when I found this stuff because diatoms are a great indicator. Like you, I can apply, uh, diatoms to your soil, and I can come back next year to year after the year after, year after. And I'll be able to find them. Um, if they're healthy,

they will have a chloroplast. And I can see the, their nucleus and their other, you know, um, organs, um, if they're not healthy, if they're dead, they're just an empty shell made of silica. And silicon has a tendency to last, uh, quite a while in the soil. So there's a great indication that I can take aquatic organisms and put 'em in a

terrestrial environment and they will survive. Um, so that being said, when I take my, um, low temp compost and I throw it into, uh, a situation where I'm using agitation, centrifugal, force, aeration, soft collision, and I'm breaking off all of these pieces of, of what I want to call predigested organic matter. So it's in the digestion process, but it hasn't been completely digested into, uh,

like a palm or a mom. Um, it, there's still very much, uh, a lot of organic matter that has not gone through any kind of decomposition. So now I've, I've taken that, I've, I've, I've banged it against each other. I've pulled off all of the little bits that have decomposed. Um, and I've, I've done this in a, in an aqueous environment with fish brew and, and some worm castings. So now all of a sudden I have all of this suspended stuff, uh,

in the water column, uh, it looks like chocolate water. So it's very, very, uh, rich with hemic acids, which we've talked about as, as the biological superfood have introduced all these microbes from, from fish brew, um, which is like incredible. If you look at the, the DNA sequences of what they've done, uh, it's called me, me barcoding, where you're getting a general idea of who's present or who's been there, um, which gets deeper into horizontal gene transfer, which we can't go there today,

. But that being said is, now I have all of this diversity. I have all the endo fights from, from the, the decomposed organic matter. I have all of these, uh, biological constituents that came in on the fish brew. And then I have all of these secondary and tertiary metabolytes from the digestion of the worms, um, that is called worm castings. So this, in many ways, you know, when I started this journey,

I had no idea what the fuck I was doing. But now, 14, 15 years later, I'm really seeing like, that was like, uh, what do you call intuition instinct drove me down that path of, well, everyone talks about how great worm castings are. I should add some of those. Oh, and I know how good fish manure is, cuz every time I play with it and I appropriately aerobically stabilize it, and I pour it on plants, man, those plants explode.

And I also know the value of compost and, and the fact that it brings in these, these super foods like human and folic acids, as well as all these, uh, secondary and tertiary metabolytes that, that are happening during the decomposition phase. So bam, there's a, there's a grand slam home run for you mm-hmm.

by adding all these things together, using mechanical forces to separate them, and then using, uh, what I call dewatering techniques, which is through vibration vibrating the organic matter to shed all of the liquid off of it. Um, now I have a biological super sauce, , secret sauce, whatever you want to call it. Now, if I want to make that shelf stable, then I have to press it. So take the dewatering to another level,

and then I take that and fluff it up. And that's what you got was, was that poem, inoculated poem. That's easy to work with. Just put it in a glass of water, stir it up. As a matter of fact, uh, on the podcast couple weeks back, I actually drank some, I put some 11 year old product in a glass of water, stirred it up and drank it on camera because I'd been telling people that I, I eat this shit all the time, Every time I work with it, I get it in my mouth,

my ears, it's always, my fingernails are always dirty. So I'm, I'm just constantly being inoculated with this stuff, . So I proved that,

hey, it's not gonna hurt you. It's actually really super beneficial to your, your entire digestive track because you're putting in microbes that aren't there, or weren't there, or haven't been there for a long time that are doing, again, all these crazy bio geochemical reactions that we have only begun to discuss because science is moving into an interdisciplinary mode because the reduction side of it has realized we can't

just keep producing everything down to nothing and then not talk to anybody about how does this affect their work or how does this affect that processor? So it, it's an interesting time to be alive as these things are happening, but we don't have the technology yet to really delve down what those processes are and why they're so important and how they are, are affecting everything around them. So again, if, if you don't have the technology, but you have the knowhow,

well then that's the key to the whole thing is all right. I, I don't know why it works, but I know it does work, so I'm gonna keep doing it. And, and that's, Go ahead. Go ahead. Okay. So, so, um, you know, bringing this home a little bit to, uh, like how it can be used by the cultivator, um, we, it sounds like this cold compost inoculate does all of the things that we think a thermal compost will do. Uh, the, you know, we, we, we, we use a thermal compost as an amendment.

We use a thermal compost as a, as a top dress. We use a thermal compost to meet compost tea. Why do we do that? Because we wanna add, um, you know, life vibrance, uh, to our plants, but we know because they've been cooked so hot, because, you know, that's a smart thing to do when there's pathogens. Um, that, that it's, it's actually not as vibrant with life as, as we would hope it would be, um, in our gardens.

And so what we've done with this is we have, um, used a lower temperature and we have gathered our microbes and, and protozoa and other biology we have, we've gone through the effort to bring them together from these three different directions. And, and we are actually creating a air quotes compost, which is essentially organic matter. That is actually what we think of when we think of

compost. But the common form of compost that we get, which is thermal, actually is not supercharged the way we really want it to be. And so this cold or organic matter because of the care we've put into it, is actually what we idealize about compost. Yeah. Biomimicry, right? Mm-hmm. , we talk about biomimicry all the time. I've had arguments with people that say there's no such thing as as compost in

nature. And I'm like, No, you're wrong. Look at, every time there's a flood that's all piled up all the sticks and brush and, and algae from the bottom of the river is piled up, and that's float Sam, that's a compost pile underneath the forest. That's a compost pile. That's just a giant compost pile. Dead animals, dead sticks, leaves, you know, plants that have come in and gone out, um, they're all creating compost.

Now that compost doesn't heat up in the forest floor, nor does it de float Sam the pile that's, you know, left by the side of the river. Those don't heat up. Those, those would be considered cold compost. Do they heat up to some degree? Oh, I'm sure in, in pockets of it when it's really dense and and compressed, that's gonna heat up. But is it gonna go thermo fillic? No, it's not. It's not gonna, it's not gonna ever get to a position where it could combust.

And that is the end of theil phase. If you let it run, run wild is combustion is when the microbes start to produce alcohol, and then it, and then it can, you know, self combust. So, you know, again, thermo fights are, are important to understand. And, and the getting your head wrapped around the fact that you do not want to cross-contaminate, you do not want to deal with pathogens, you do not want to deal with seeds. Thermo fillic process is a great way to bypass that potential problem.

All right. So, um, I wanna go back to talking about the, the actual physical structure of good compost. Uh, during the third set, we're gonna, we're gonna talk a little bit more about your actual manufacturing techniques, all of these ways that you massage it. But, um, you, um, you know, you made a special point to talk about, um, you're breaking the pieces down to a small size using these other methods that we're gonna talk about.

But you were very specific that the reason that you're doing it is to make these organic matter grains have lots of housing and community opportunities for the microbes and protozoa and ABA and other denin of the R oe, right? Mm-hmm. . So, so talk a little bit that about that would you, about the actual physical structure of good compost.

So this goes back to poem, particulate organic matter and moham mineral associated organic matter, mineral associated organic matter is going to be very dense, kind of like, um, worm castings except for even more dense. So think of bulk density, how much something weighs by volume. Um, and those weights are going to be indicators of how long that material, that organic matter's gonna last in the soil system, as well as how quickly it will release its nutrient.

So poem will last two to three months in an organic system, uh, moham, um, will last two to three years. So there's a big difference between, What do. You mean between what last, what does last mean? So, um, you throw, um, poem down on a, on an orchard and three months it's gonna be gone, it's gonna be decomposed by all of the biology, not the thermo fights, but the other decomposers, whether that's fungi or bacteria, but it's gonna be, it's gonna go away.

It's going to have been used up as a nutrient for the plants that you've applied it to. Does that make sense? Yep, I. Do. Okay. So again, the, the mom is gonna last years and the poem's gonna last months. So what that tells me is that if I colonize that poem and I apply it, then what's gonna happen is we're gonna have a fast nutrient release within, within three months. It's all gonna be gone.

It's gonna be consumed and released, plant available, or at least stored in a, in a biology in the bacteria. Um, whereas moan, um, you're not gonna get that fast release. You're gonna get a really, really slow release, which is good for soil structure. Um, cuz you want, you want concrete foundations. You don't want to build your your palace on bamboo stilts, right?

But if I'm trying to get, uh, inoculation, I want to get those microbes that, that have set up shop and, and in these condominium on, on this poem, then the best way to do it is use the poem because I know it's going to have released all of that biology into the soil relatively quickly. And to be honest with you, um, Momum is so dense, the bulk density is so great that, that, again,

you don't have the ability for, um, you know, mass colonization. You, it's too dense, it doesn't let the oxygen in to feed the bacteria that in turn are, are providing food sources for the proto and it gets complex. But I, I think I explained it okay there. Yeah. And so, um, the, you want to have these, these small fluffy, um, you know, granular, I, I guess it's probably the outside of them or as an also we don't want anything

like smooth. Um, so it creates all these like small micro hotels for all of these microbes. That is essentially the point. Exactly, dude. Like when, remember when we were smashing up rocks. ? Yeah. Oh God, yeah. I remember smashing up rocks to make my, uh, to make my region tent with the, with the soil horizons. Oh my God. Yep. Yep. So no smooth surfaces. Yeah.

Think of it like, um, if you polish something, um, it's very difficult for oxidization for, uh, you know, any kind of mechanical, um, force to, to break it down. So that polishes is, is protection. And, and yes, you, you want porous, you want surface area as much as you possibly can get. So things can get into the cracks and set up shop and, and set up their biofilm and start to expand out. But they can't do that on a smooth surface. They're, they, they're, they don't have the benefit of,

of the protection on three sides. They're, they're basically exposed on 180 degrees on a polished surface where if they're in a little crack or a crevice, there's a very small exposure to, to the outside environment. All right. That makes sense. Uh, especially with the word porous, that,

that gives me the picture I'm looking for. So, um, so the last thing I wanna talk about here in set two is, um, uh, what is essentially the point of the, of the paper we refer, we referred to earlier, which is talking about how, you know, in this cold compost that we are, are creating, we want to have there be a variety of funes there. Um, and so like of course there is, you know, you know, basic funes that,

that we're all familiar with, with like my cel. But this paper goes into, uh, depth that there is a wide variety of different fungal participants that the more of them we have, the more a combination of fungals and bacterias and nutrients. It, it becomes this kind of wild mix and match where it like a buffet that, that, um, like everybody can get what they need.

But I, you know, I've never really heard anybody talk too much about the variety of, of funes except for like, Oh, do you wanna make a, you know, bacteria dominant, um, compost tea, or do you wanna make a fungal dominant compost tea? That's about as far as I generally hear it. So would you please address, um, the, the, the fungal in the cold compost, uh, their importance and, um, you know, as much as you can tell us like what they're doing there?

Okay, so you hit on a couple of really important parts. Um, first one is imo, right? Everybody's like imo, imo, and IMO is the foundation of natural farming. What is imo? Well, I'll be honest with you, it's yeasts. It's not safi fungi. It's basically the precursor, the, the, the success system that has to be in place in order for SAP robes to do their work, to come out, to have an environment where they can survive. So it goes back along the same understanding principles of soil succession.

So you start with a very low f tob ratio, swamp, uh, non non associated, uh, plants, uh, more bacterially dominant. And then you move all the way up into the conifers, which are very fung dominant and, and wide variety of different, uh, constituents that in play. So in order to build that, um, foundation or that roadway so that you can burn in the groups of, uh, following the success groups into play, you need those yeast. You need those, um, lower success fungal, um, life forms.

I'm gonna use that term because there are so much we don't know so little in that paper. Um, they talked about knowing about 0.01% about what the fuck is really going on in these biologics. When I read that, I actually screenshot it and circled it and sent it to some of my compost friends. I'm like, do you know, we only know what 0.01% of, of the microbes even are. Like, I, I I was astonished to realize that we know almost nothing about what's in our soil.

Uhhuh. And, and then worse yet, uh, the interactions and those interactions are the key to the whole thing. Like, like why does a thermo fight heat up? Why, why is, why is that getting out of control? Why is it because I put so much nitrogen in there that if this pile's gonna combust, like what is that biogeochemical process that's happening that's creating so

much heat? It, it's, it gets crazy. Um, so you know, that being said, IMO works so great because it's putting all of the foods and the succession species that need to be present for some of these older later succession species to come into play. So, um, in, in understanding the compost process, in getting a fung dominated compost, you've gotta have those yeasts to, to even begin to get the sap robes to come in and do their thing. And we're not gonna get into micro I,

but we're gonna stay with decomposing fungi for right now. And the yeast, um, and the molds, those are decomposers. So they're good guys to have to bring in. Think of pre predator, we talk about this all the time. So the yeast and the molds are like deer and the sap robes are like the saber tooth tiger or, or the leopard that that's gonna come in and eat them. Um, so that's how you get that system to start functioning is by creating the prey so that the predators come in. Mm-hmm. . Um,

so where are we gonna get our predators from? Well, we get 'em from old rotten wood chips. Um, that's one of the major sources for getting, um, decomposing sap fungi, um, you call masum. Uh, a lot of people don't understand that maum is actually like a cord. It's filled with hundreds, if not hundreds of thousands of different individual organisms that are all working together, uh, like a internet super highway. And that white coating on the outside that is actually a protection,

uh, against ation. So that when, if that, if that individual organism, that individual sacro actually got exposed to oxygen, it would disintegrate or, or exposed to uv, it would, it would disintegrate. So that white coating is actually the, basically, think of it as the, the, the wrapping around your electrical cord. It's to prevent something from going catastrophically wrong.

And the, the, the most interesting component of that is that when you find that you've, that my cord in your year old, two year old wood chips and you pick it up and all those other little pieces of, of organic matter are hanging on like a web underneath it, now, you know, you've got, uh, many, many different later succession species of sap robes. So that's why, again, if you, if you take the time to actually harvest these chips that are loaded with my

solenium and you heat it up over 120, you just wasted all your time. Mm-hmm. , you, you killed everything.

So that's why it's so important that you keep this at a lower temperature so that they will colonize your organic matter so that when you go to actually strip it or use it, they have gone through a spoilation phase where they have, uh, gotten to a point where they grew out a ton of spores or clubs or feet depending on, you know, which camp you wanna talk about as far as, you know, what the different, um, sexual methods that this fungi do to produce their offspring.

So I want to ask you about these different sources for, um, these MyUM, these ver varieties of fungals because we, we know we want them and we know we want a, a as, you know, as wide of variety as we can. And we know that the, the, these, you know, using imo, indigenous microorganisms, that's like a, uh, that's a, a simple low level version that will evolve some fungals,

which is great. But then we're also going to throw, uh, wood chips into our, our pile because we want to capture these hundreds, if not thousands of varieties of funes. I'm guessing though that, um, we probably want to pull our funes from a couple different sources. So, uh, you know, uh, you know, our IMO box is fantastic, uh, our, our wood ships. That's fabulous.

What are a couple other places that I want to hunt for wild crafting these funes to bring it back and put it in my pile so I can have it be not only Fung dominant, but hella diverse Fung dominant. All right, so let's, let's clean up, uh, the Achilles heel of imo. So it is taught, and most people understand or believe that that IMO collection IMO one is going to have all of the fungal constituents that

you're looking for. It does not, It only has the foundation yeast, and yeah, it's probably got some spores, but it's not nearly as diverse as one would think. Uh, generally you see the, the microscope slides people post on Instagram, those are called pin molds. Um, they're very important, uh, foundational creatures for succession to occur. So you producing a shit ton of pin molds.

But when you introduce IMO three, which again is going to be, uh, uh, very pin mold heavy, and you introduce that into a IMO four, which is when you blend it with soil, that's when you're really gonna get your fungal colonization. That's when you're gonna get your SAP robes, your, your more later succession fungi to come into play, because there's the food there for him. Mm-hmm. , right?

There's all those pin molds doing all their thing that are providing the foundation or the paving the highway for the SAP robes to come into play. So if you're looking for, you know, um, a slow version of, of getting to a fungal dominance, then yeah, that works great. But the problem is, if you don't have super healthy soil to blend with your IMO three, you're not gonna get this, the kind of fung dominant compost that you're, or organic matter that you're talking about. So, back to,

how do I get this into my low temp pile? All right. So number one is, is finding the old one to two year old punk wood ships with the MyUM that is gonna have tremendous diversity in it, because that cord, the thicker the cords are, and the more long and wey the cords are, the more different organisms. You're, you're getting SAP ropes. Um, the other piece of this puzzle too is foods like, what are fungal foods? While we know, like steel cut oats, um, there's a bunch of them, and you,

you can research this on your own. Um, but the other wonderful place to get SAP robes are from leaf stuff. So I talk about, uh, prevailing wind, right? So everywhere you go, there's generally what would consider, uh, the winds direction the most days is gonna be blowing in this direction.

So basically, you go to wherever, um, there's a, a stone wall, a down tree, a creek, or a depression, and the leaves that blow across the yard will fall in a natural pile, um, either behind that log or, you know, in that depression. There you go. There's an incredibly diverse, uh, indigenous SAP fungi factory for you to add to your compost. So again, diversity, diversity, diversity leaves, chips, uh, hay hay's, another good one, Not hay straw straws is already gonna have decomposers

attached to it. Um, and then, yeah, if you can add some humic acids, um, they, they're also a very good, again, biological superfood. They're good for both bacterial and fungal kingdoms. Um, then you're gonna have, uh, incredible success. And then there's one last piece of this puzzle. If you're in a place where you don't have access to these kinds of things, you can, you go to your local mushroom producer and ask him for a spent mushroom block.

You do not want mushroom compost because mushroom compost has gone theil and they've been forced to kill all of the biology, because that's what the U S D A requires of anybody who's making commercial compost has to hit that temperature. Usually it's 1 53 times over the course of X amount of days, depending on what state you're in. Um, so if you get mushroom compost, you're getting, you're, you're not getting organisms. If you get the mushroom block, now you're getting the organisms.

Wow, that's really cool. I have access to many mushroom blocks, which I will now go get. Um, so I wanna, I wanna take this idea of wildcrafting it. I wanna to kind of say, I wanna apply what you just said to my world, and, and, and then everybody can kind of like do that in their own heads for where they live. So you're talking about, uh, collecting these leaf collections that have naturally come together,

um, you know, in indentations and along tree lines and stuff like that. And so, so if, if I'm wanting to do that kind of collection in my neighborhood, and so that I have got the widest diversity of fungal in my cold compost as possible, for me, I would, for example, my neighbor has got a long fence. And so the leaves like we've all seen in like, you know, suburban neighborhoods, even though I live way out, um, the, the leaves blow against the fence and they collect at the bottom.

And so I can imagine going over there with a five gallon bucket and just like, like, you know, smooshing all of these leaves together and filling that bucket up. And so then, okay, great. I've got a, I've got a collection from this particular bio region along my neighbor's fence. Um, I also have got this, um, uh, huge ass, uh, tree in my yard. And, um, because it, the, the base of the tree kind of swells up because of the old roots structure.

There's always a whole bunch of like, magic like sitting in there too. Plus as, as you've talked about before, um, there's all of these, these yeast, these IMOs that actually kind of fall from these trees, these, these fungal dusts that fall from the trees. So, so, alright, I will collect all of the leaves that are at the bottom of the tree as well.

And I'm gonna get a little of this little fur fur pit bits and, um, uh, f ir fur bits and uh, uh, and some leaves and, you know, I don't know, random organic matter debris. And so like, I'll fill a bucket with that and then, and then maybe I would go over to the, um, the estuary here on the island, go over to like Fern cove. Um, because there's all these different leaves that, that, uh, get collected in the brush that is along the, along with salt water.

So, so maybe I'll get some salt spray and like a different variety of fungus is because that's a yet another different environment. And, and I'm thinking to myself, I, I want to, I want the environments to be different because these different biological environments are gonna have different fungals.

So now I've got like these three buckets full, and of course this could be, you know, you could do as many as you want, but for this example, I got these three buckets and I'm now gonna put those in the pile along with my imo. And so I've got, I've got the, the very basic IMO yeasts, and I've got the way more complex funes from three different areas near where I live. Plus I've got all this higher end Cool. My cel um, action going on and all the hangers on that you mentioned.

And so boom, is, is that by ideal? Yes. Um, just a couple little points. So, um, when you're collecting, um, leaf duff, you really wanna scrape back the dry leaves on the top, and you want to get down into the layer where they're kind of slimy. Um, that's where the magic is not in the, in the top layer that's dried out. The top layer that's dried out will then get covered by this year's crop of leaves, and that'll pressed out and then become the wet, nasty, slimy,

um, underneath for, for the following season. So you're, again, you're, you're looking to get partially decomposed, naturally decomposed, um, organic matter in the form of leaves that have started to break down. And I always encourage people to, maybe this is the perfect place to use that commercial compost for six bucks, is, is to wildcraft responsibly and bring something in and leave that

in place of what you've taken out. Um, so that way if you spread, you know, you've, you've taken out say, six feet of, of this, uh, you know, top inch or two of this leaf mold, um, you can then spread that commercial compost down and then cover it back up with the, with the dried out leaves. And you've not just totally disturbed or fucked nature by leaving a big scar. Oh, I love that. And we've already talked about how while it might not really work well for a

compost, it actually works great as a fertilizer. And so, and so we are, we are helping diversify that area. Right on. Yeah. Wow. All right. Cool. And then one other piece for mushroom blocks is that people have to understand that when they take that mushroom block, um, and they leave it, it's gonna get this, uh, liquid slimy stuff in the bag.

Um, that's actually a bio side that's produced by the fungi to protect from bacterial infections and or yeast infections or anything else, um, that fungi is doing everything it's can to, to build a fortress with the white cake around the outside edge, but it's also releasing these, uh, biotoxins to fight off anybody that could possibly compete with them.

So what I generally tell people to do is take the bag and run it over with your car on soil so you smashed it, and then just leave it in the bag so it gets nasty. It should get all different colors in it, um, but it shouldn't have any real liquid buildup. Um, because that's the bio side that you do not want to add to your compost bio because you will knock back your diversity.

So the dealing with mushroom blocks is a little bit more, um, creative than than one might think, but the longer you let those blocks dry out, um, and if it's raining, it's raining, doesn't matter. Just, just don't allow that bio side to build up in the bag, run it over, you know, you don't wanna rip all the plastic off leave, leave the plastic on it until you're ready to actually introduce it into your compost pile. And then when you're going to introduce it into your compost pile,

it's gonna have this funky smell to it. And again, remember, our noses are there to protect us, to warn us from dangers. Um, so when you smell it, you're gonna kind of like pull your head back and go, Oh, that smells really funky. Yeah, that's okay. It's kind of like when you ferment things, it smells funky, like you're not gonna want to eat this stuff.

But when it has that funky smell to it, you know, it's ready, it, it's going to, um, be providing all kinds of secondary, tertiary metabolytes for everything to kick in. The only part of that I want to tease at is that running over it with your car, I, I, I believe that the car is the, on our goal is to break up the cake so that the, the white on the outside that is pr providing the protective barrier for the cake, um, gets destroyed. Right? Like that disturbed disturbed,

okay. So, so like the cakes that I have come in contact with actually break up very easily in the bag by hand. And so it, it would be just as effective if I just take the bag and I hold it, you know, well with my two hands and just, you know, twist my hands in different directions. And so break the exterior of the cake up a bit and then just go with that, right? There's there, that's, that's the only goal of it, right?

Uh, there is something to do with, with the pressure. I, I can't explain it biochemical process that that's occurring, but I have noticed that when I do run it over, uh, again, I'm not, I'm not trying to break it up, I'm trying to just kind of like squish out any of the bio side and disturb that, that outer coding so that now the local indigenous biology can come into play and have fun with it as well.

Cause there's still a tremendous amount of resources, uh, in, in nutritional value that's li blocked up in that block, um, that, that fungi is trying to protect. So I wanna, I wanna expose it to my local environment, so I'm getting all of my indigenous microorganisms to colonize it as well. So that's why I'm saying like, just run it over. Uh, again,

you don't want to tear the bag off of it. You just wanna, you just wanna like pop it so that, you know, again, air exchange can come in, the bio side gets squished out, um, and then let it sit and get funky. Man. The more funky it gets, the more diverse, um, of, of in, uh, the more diverse of microorganisms that you'll get from your micro environment. Does that make sense? Yeah, I totally follow. All right. So we're gonna go ahead and take another break. Um,

and then we're gonna finish up with set three. We are gonna talk, um, uh, more about the, the mechanical massaging, um, that Layton does, uh, to create these, uh, community opportunities in the inoculate, um, organic material. And then we're gonna talk a little bit about how to actually, um, to use this in your garden. Um, you are listening to Shaping Fire, and my guest today is Soil biologist Layton Morrison. For decades, Americans have enjoyed cannabis flowers and joints and bongs and bowls.

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So bef during the break late and I were talking about, uh, the inputs that, uh, for this cold compost, um, because when I, uh, visited him there in Ventura, uh, I don't know, right before Covid started, um, he had all this stuff in his backyard that he was growing, all looked like, like weeds and shrubs and stuff. And I'm all like, Oh, what, what, you know, what are these plants? And you're like, Oh, I'm growing this stuff for my compost and I didn't think much about it and moved

on. Um, but it's not until today that I realized, um, whereas most of us will wild craft our inputs for the compost or, or we just produce it like, you know, um, you know, air quotes accidentally on our property. Um, Layton, you actually are growing, um, green inputs that you know you like for making your cold compost. And the idea of, of growing specific things intentionally just to,

to kill it for your compost is really interesting. And, and, and I found it kind of inspiring and I'm probably not the only one, so be before we like move on. Um, why don't, why don't you just hit on that? Like, like what, what are you growing for your compost and, and why do you bother. ? Well, that's a good question. Um, Chango, uh, I've found that again, diversity, diversity, diversity, um, is the key to making some incredible, uh,

end products. And so, um, yeah, I grow, uh, indigenous, uh, grasses, pollinator plants, um, flowers, uh, even even some little shrubs. And, and basically I don't kill them, I just cut them back, uh, from time to time. Um, I don't let things go to seed that I put into the pile. So if I see something that's gonna seed out, I either just let it seed out, um, and then wait till it's done seeding and then take the brown cuz the plant dies

after it seeds out. Um, and just make sure that I'm getting all the seeds off of it and leave them in place in the soil. Um, and then the greens, of course, I I trim back the grasses. I love flowers in my compost pile. Um, I think they just bring a whole nother level of, um, biological, uh,

super foods to, to the decomposers that they wouldn't ordinarily get. Um, so yeah, I think that everybody, if you got a little corner somewhere, you can obviously just buy green manure seeds or wildflower seeds or whatever, whatever's locally grown or, uh, locally responsibly grown in your area. Why wouldn't you? And again, you know, I'm, I'm blessed. I don't go through a, uh, a harsh winter here. Um, yes, we have certain plants that do die back in, in the colder weather, but for the most part,

everything pretty much grows year round. So I'm very blessed in that regard. But if I was to say do this in New England, um, I typically would build a pile in spring and I'd build a pile and fall. So I'd be harvesting, um, you know, the, the whatever I could get my hands on in the spring, like the new stuff that was popping up. Um, and then in the fall I would obviously be collecting stuff, uh, throughout the summer to, to build the pile in the pile in the fall.

So it's a little bit trickier in, in an area where you have a true hard winner, um, to do this. But even if you only built one pile a year, you'd be fine. Um, but you, yeah, there's no reason why you can't harvest. Um, the, the local, you know, or grow. Whatever you feel is, is important for your area. Um, and then you use the biomass in your compost pile.

I like the idea cause you kind of put it on its head, right? Cause like, I take this stuff, you know, I, I grow flowers and all this kind of stuff on my property too, and I just, they naturally find their way into a pile.

But the fact that you kind of went backwards and you're like, Okay, what stuff do I like in my compost that, and now I'm gonna grow that like, um, it's, it's a d it's, it's, it's a subtle but important difference from, Oh, I, I grew all of this stuff because I just like the flowers and I hope it makes good compost. Versus I want good composts, so I'm gonna pick the flowers and grasses that make good compost.

That also I happen to like, it's like it's, it, it changes the direction of the decision making and I find that, uh, kind of delightful. Yeah, and, and don't get me wrong, I mean, I'll actually like pull up roots and use those in the compost as well. So if something seeds, I'll let it seed out and then I'll pull that plant, cuz I know I've got seeds that are gonna happen pop next year and I'll, I'll compost that root ball because that's got the rises in it.

Right on. So, alright, so here we are in set three. And, um, the, the two main things I want to talk about is first, um, uh, you know, you have talked about the mechanical ways in which you manipulate the organic matter to make more porous community opportunities for all the

life forms in the R iOS sphere. And, um, you know, we've kind of just hit on that a little bit and then I've referred to it as massaging, but like, I've been to your workshop and seen all the stuff that you do and, and I think so far we've given everybody a pretty good, um, roadmap for how to make this at at their house except for

this part. So would you, um, take us through the different mechanical manipulations that you work the organic matter through so that it is optimum for an inoculate, um, process? Yeah, sure. As a matter of fact, I recently did a, uh, a video, a one hour lecture and, uh, an outline with a friend of mine, um, Jimmy Perkins, um, who's actually gonna put it up online at some point.

And we talked about charging 50 bucks for it. Um, but it would be a great resource for people, um, to actually physically see it, what I'm talking about and how I go about it. Um, so that's, that's something that it was designed for, uh, the homeowner. So it's, it's using mechanical forces on a smaller scale than what I do. Um, but needless to say, these mechanical forces are scalable. Um, so I have a 85 gallon compost, or excuse me, um, um, yogurt maker that I converted into,

uh, one of my strippers. Um, and actually I call her Roque And my other stripper, I call her Sandy because, uh, I went, went through super storm Sandy and Sandy Hook in New England, and I said, You know what? Poor Sandy's got a bad name. Let's, let's make something good out of the name Sandy. So the one that I travel with is, is Sandy. And it was basically a older washing machine that I converted, um, to do this, uh, what I call soft collision.

So in a soft collision, think about, uh, the two of us standing in a pool, um, you know, up to our neck in water and underwater, I punch you. Like you're gonna feel it, you're gonna feel the force of it, but it's not gonna hurt you. Like if we were standing in the air and I did that, you, you, you'd feel some serious pain.

So that's the kind of philosophy that I want you to think about when you are talking about soft colliding, um, organic materials or matters together in a way that you're brushing off the, the blue pieces, uh, the fungi, the, the, the biology. Um, you're not damaging it, you're, you're basically using its own bio mass to, to break off the pieces that, um, are suitable and ready to be used, um, as poem, um, to inoculate your soil. All right. So number one is soft colliding using a washing machine.

Would you give a quick description of, of your retrofit of that washing machine? Yeah. Um, you have to find a really old machine. Um, the newer ones have, um, a lot of different sensors and computers thanks to China, um, which I've tried desperately to convert, uh, to many, many lost hours and frustration because as soon as I get rid of this control, that sensor is tripping, and now the machine won't go on, or, or, I, I keep this control, but I get rid of that sensor because I don't want it.

And then now this control will no longer function properly. So you have to find a very, uh, old machine. Like, I don't think you can get 'em anything after two thousands, you're probably not gonna be able to convert. Um, so that being said, there's not a huge pool of these pieces of equipment that have survived, uh, that long in a junk pile. So it's, it's not a particular easy, um, way to go about this. I mean, I did, I did this conversion back, uh,

in about 2010 was when I made it. Um, but I had access to, you know, used appliance stores that were, you know, it had plenty of older inventory that I could manipulate. Um, so bottom line is, you know, you, you have to gut it. So you have to take the whole thing apart, power wash the inside, get rid of all the residues, all the soap, sc, um, you gotta replace bearings, um, you know, check for, uh, wire phrase. Um, but you're basically looking at, you know, taking all of the wiring out of it.

So you basically have two functions, spin and agitate, and no time restriction, like all those little control that, that little dial you bypass that whole thing. So it, it's not something for the lighthearted, you've gotta be somewhat of a, a mechanical or high mechanical aptitude and somewhat of an inventor to actually do this. Um, but it's possible if I did it, anybody can do it.

So that being said, um, the, the more simple way, uh, for, uh, a user friendly small scale application is to just use a paint mixer or a compound mixer, um, and a cordless drill on a low setting. And that's where I did this video with, with Jimmy, so that, uh, you know, people could see, Oh, wow, this is really actually quite simple. Um, and in, in my work, I've, I've taken a little bit further because I'm really trying to produce the most powerful inoculant I can. So I also use, um,

along with agitation, I use aeration. So I, I have a, uh, little air pump that, that pumps air in down into the agitator. And on the agitator, I created these whips out of polyethylene pipes that go all the way out to the edge of the barrel. So when that's going back and forth, those are basically acting as a sweep to sweep the material off the floor

of the, uh, washing machine. And with the aeration, now as it sweeps, it's blowing the stuff up into the, you know, higher up into the water column, and then only to sink back down in the center and repeat, agitate and repeat, repeat, repeat, or what is it? Rinse and repeat. So by doing that, I'm, I'm adding, uh, another level of, um, physical force to this organic matter. Uh, so it's colliding on the way up, it's getting swept, it's getting ground,

it's getting pushed into each other. Um, and then of course, I'm adding a tremendous amount of oxygen, dissolved oxygen into the aqueous solution of fish, brew, and water. So I'm really getting another added benefit by by doing that. But again, without, without a proper piece of equipment, it's a lot more difficult to do that. Um, the yogurt mixer has sweeps on the outside pushing in. Um, it's a cone bottom. And of course, I've used a,

a tremendous amount of oxygen blowing up through the center of that. So like, that's creating that same aeration, um, agitation that I did with the, with the washing machine. Um, and then on top of that, I have two impellas opposing each other. So one ipel is pulling from the bottom and throwing it up, and the ipel above that is actually throwing, pulling from the top and throwing down. So I'm getting three levels of,

of agitation with that piece of equipment. And I, the reason why is because I'm trying to do it, um, as efficient and as quick as possible. So I'm using all the different forces, uh, possible to, you know, again, produce high volume of, uh, you know, super powerful inoculate in a short period of time. So. If, if this washing machine that you have, um, uh, messed with, it's got the, uh, organic material and water in it, um, what's coming out of it, Like, like, um.

All right, so inside the barrel, um, you'll see that's got holes, little tiny, you know, eight inch drill holes all the way around it. So that drill, those drill holes are acting as a screen. So when I'm washing my compost, anything bigger than an eight inch isn't gonna get through those holes.

It just stays in the barrel. And when I spin it, I'm now pulling all of that moisture out of that product, or out of what's left in the barrel, and then what's left in the barrel, I just scoop up and I throw it right back in the compost pile again. So that's the first level of screening. And so, and, and, and the water that's coming out of it, that is not a waste product. No, that's actually the, that's the goodies, that's the point. So, so you're using the water and the agitation to, um,

strip everything out of your organic material. Um, and while, while you're still gonna throw that organic material back in the pile, the goal is to, um, have the organic material give up its goodies. Right? Right. And release all the humic acids, folic acids, secondary, tertiary mely along with all of the biology that went in there. And again,

I'm using fish brew in that process. So I'm basically using, uh, about a gallon and a half of fish brew and about three and a half to four gallons by volume of compost in that one process. Now, on a smaller scale, you can do this in a compound bucket and, and, you know, buy a quarter a gallon of, uh, fish brew. Um, add that in there with, you know, a couple handfuls of compost, you know, agitate for 15, 20 minutes on slow, and you'll get the same end results.

Um, you just won't have been as efficient in removing all of those organisms and components that you're looking for. Right on. And, um, I know you and I both share a, uh, a love of the fish brew product, but I'm always trying to make people, uh, self-sufficient. So if somebody doesn't wanna buy the fish brew, they can, you know, go their own way and collect fish poop. So find themselves an aquaponics company or whatever. The, the point is,

is that, you know, fish brew is the easy way to go. But, but you can also do this if you use your aquarium water. Oh, absolutely. Aquarium water is wonderful. I mean, personally, I don't know why every farmer does not have at least a frigging, um, you know, aquarium at the . And instead, why not a fish pond? Why not? You know, I always promote, uh, aquatic microorganisms as so important and one of the biggest missing

pieces from the soil, because we don't have mass migration anymore. We, we, the soil used to get inoculated every time a, a migration occurred. But that doesn't happen anymore. So, uh, Amos are, in my mind, the, the foundation of, of creating regenerative healthy soil. Um, so without them, um, what are you really accomplishing? So another way to, to get aquatic microorganisms is to do a, um, a, a wild craft of kelp or, or algae,

uh, duck weed, any of those things. Um, and you basically, any aquatic plants, you put 'em in a bucket, put the wire mesh on top, put a brick on it so that the plants are all submersed below the water, put it in the hot sun, um, for three to five days, Depends on where you are and what temperature you're at. Um, but what you'll see is a white frosty foam that raises to the surface. And again, it's gonna have a funky smell, so your body's gonna be like, Ooh, I don't, that's weird. What is that?

So you're gonna kind of get a reaction to it. It, it's not gonna smell like poop. Um, but it's not gonna smell like forest floor either. It's gonna smell funky, kind of like those mushroom blocks. Um, but that is a very powerful aquatic microorganism, uh, inoculate that you can pour on your compost file. And, you know, it's funny that, that you say that about fish brew. And I just traveled the entire country and, uh, we did soil micro, uh,

soil awareness classes. I, I think I did seven of them, um, across the country. And, and I had the same answer at every one of them. I'm like, Dude, you need fish brew, dude. You need fish brew. And I was got to the point where I was like, Man, these people probably think I own fish brew , and reality. I don't, I have no stake in it. All I can tell you is that I've been using that product since Rodale

since the inception of trying to do this. A actually before Rodale, I'd come to realize that there was something really special about fish manure. Um, because every time I pour it on a plant, I'd see plant reaction. That's the whole reason I went down to Rodale to talk to this woman named Elaine, who had no idea who she was, and show her this stuff and put it under the microscope. And she came back and goes, Holy shit, where did you get this? So it is the, the,

the missing piece of the pie. The biology, just like in soil science, they're missing the biology. Everybody's missing the biology. And can you do this with your own compost? Absolutely. You have two choices, time or money, how much time you got. If you don't have a lot of time, then you need to spend the money. If you don't have a lot of money, money, then you gotta spend the time. But can you do it without fish brew? Absolutely.

But it's gonna take time and, and trials and, and, you know, learning how to work with, um, aquatic organisms. All right. So back to how you are mechanically, uh, breaking up and stripping your soil. We've got the first one, which is your soft colliding, uh, washing machine. Mm-hmm. . Um, what's another one? Okay, so soft colliding, um, AAN dissolved oxygen in the water.

Again, adding those other elements because every time that bubble comes up, it pushing something out of the way and displacing and putting it back into mechanical, uh, back into a mechanical force position. Um, so then after you go through, uh, those basic, or I wanna call beginning processes of, of pulling apart the organic matter, um, the next would be, uh, through dewatering.

So by dewatering there's a couple of different ways to do it. Um, there are some really cool screw presses where you'd feed in this slurry at the top of it, and it has a big auger in it, and it presses that material until the liquid oozes out the sides. And eventually you just get this cake that comes out the end where, where when the screw pressure has gotten so great that the end of it will kind of open up a little bit and let let some of the dewatered organic

matter to spill out into the waste pan. Um, I've also used, uh, personally, I've, I've went toward, um, what's called a concrete vibrator. Um, it's used to mount on the walls of foundations so that you're vibrating the concrete to get all of the air out of it. And I use that, um, in conjunction with a metal or wood frame and with a, um, stainless steel mesh screen that I string like a guitar.

Um, and then I suspended on these rubber isolators so that the vibration is only occurring on the screen and not vibrating everything else around it. So I've basically isolated the vibration. And when I hit the certain, if you do this, you get the variable speed and you turn it up or down, and you'll get this point where it's called resonance.

When everything is vibrating and the liquid just pours out of it. If you're, if you're not right, what's gonna happen is the top is gonna start vibrating, and you're gonna see all this air bubbles and stuff coming up. But when you hit that sweet spot, that resonance, you're not seeing any surface action on the top, but you're just hearing the water pouring out of the bottom. Um,

that has a couple of different advantages. Um, first of all, yes, you're getting the maximum amount of liquid out of that organic matter that is otherwise oversaturated, Um, but through vibration, your exciting electrons, and this gets really fucking deep, um, but excited electrons tend to want to interact with each other. Um,

they want to hold, they want to bond. Um, so one of the most interesting phenomenon behind this process is that I noticed after I've vibrated it and say, I wanna sift out some rejuvenate or some alliance, which is one of the two products, the solid products that I make, um, I will see, you know, the liquid goes through and then the clumps on the surface start to clad. They start to attach, they, they start to form micro aggregates almost immediately. It, it's,

it's crazy shago. Um, and I've noticed too that when I take it to the next level and, and, you know, stabilize or completely dewater the alliance or the Rejuvenate, um, I basically put it in a giant press, uh, screw press, and I just keep cranking it, um, until I squeeze out what is literally pure folic acid. Um, I then take that cake and I, again run it through a vibrating screen to create that soft,

fluffy stuff that you talked about earlier in the show. Mm-hmm. , when you put that stuff on soil, oh my God, automatically, clay platelets, uh, sand particles, they just start to bond together and create these micro aggregates. I I can only explain it through my understanding of, of quantum mechanics, that when you stimulate, um, electrons and, and protons, um, that you can actually create these, uh, paramagnetic charges, um, that begin to, um, want to attract or repel based on their charge.

I know that was a deep one. No, no. Makes sense though. So I've got five of these so far. Soft colliding, washing machine, aeration bubbles, dewatering press, concrete vibrator, and then a vibrating screen. What else? Mm-hmm. , what else? Is that it? Or the. Another one? I would would say that's the majority of it. I mean, again, um, your goal here is to lower the moisture value

of the product. If you're trying to make it shelf stable. If, if, if shelf stability isn't an issue and you just wanna make it and use it, then you don't have to go through, um, all of these processes. Like you, you can just like, literally like, just take it, mix it, I port it into a paint strainer, which was stupid. I should have used a insect screen because in turn, we're only putting it in a watering can and watering it.

So I don't need to take all the big chunks out of it. Um, the, the more chunky it is, um, the better and higher level of inoculation that you can create, uh, quicker. So again, the chunkier the better. So I think those are pretty much the primary forces. And then it's just a matter of, all right, how are you applying it? Okay. And that'll, that'll drive you to, All right, I got screen it to this level cuz I'm running it through a diaphragm pump.

Please do not use centrifugal force. Centrifugal force creates cavitation, cavitation kills biology. So you don't want to have any kind of, uh, mechanical, uh, pumps that, that will create cavitation or centrifugal force. You, you want to use a diaphragm pump. So if you are using a diaphragm pump and you've got spray rig or, or nozzles that you gotta deal with, then you have to screen to that level to get it out there in the field.

So I wanna, I wanna take a pause here and, and like for people who possibly like me, these last five steps that you have mentioned, um, were, are very, um, off putting, right? Cause like I'm not, I I, I'm, I wouldn't do this stuff, right, . And, and I think it's important to, to point out that the, the point of the show was to, uh, encourage folks to make a cold, um, a cold compost, which is essentially a, um, organic material microbe inoculate. And you don't have to do this last part.

All you needed to do was just not ha not, you know, put the care into collecting your plants and then not let the pile get too hot. Um, like that's, that's it. That that's the whole point of what we're encouraging folks to make. And, but, but to do it right, you need to do things like, you know, make sure you avoid your pathogens by using plant material only and

make sure it doesn't get too hot. And then, like the stuff that we talked about during set two, these things that we're talking about now, uh, number one, they remove the water to make your final, um, material shelf stable. But also by breaking it up, it creates, um, lots of places for microbe life to attach to the soil. Like, like it means that the, the, the, the compost will be quickly integrated into wherever you place it. And also, um, increases the places for community, right?

Because there's all these like 360 degree ridges everywhere. But, but, but if, if we lost you here at the beginning of set three with this mechanical stuff, um, don't lose heart because you don't, you don't have to do this part. This is, this is really just a way to finish it if you need to, you know, make it stable where you're gonna, you know, make it once a year and then let it sit all year, right? Don't have to do this. No, you don't have to do this.

But the reason that this is important to understand is all about delivery. So we've grown these organisms. We, we've, we've done the work. We, we've made this beautiful biologically rich compost. How do we get that biology into the soil, um, effectively and efficiently? The only way to do that is with liquid, because the liquid will help move those organisms down into the soil profile.

You take your compost, this amazing stuff that you made, and you top dress will, 50% of it's gonna get oxidated and die or exposed to UV and die. So how effective did you get those microorganisms down into the soil? Not very effectively. You lost 50% of them. So you're actually making two products here. Um, the, the one product is the actual low moisture, um, inoculated compost that even though, you know,

you've removed most of the water, it is still brimming with life. And, and it's essentially a dry good that you can sell in a bag. But then there's a secondary product or useful product, um, which is the, the water that keeps on coming out of this stuff, which is just also brimming with life. And, and that you're, you know, we don't care about it being shelf stable. You're just gonna pour that on your plants. Right? And that's the key again, is delivery.

So how do we get these microorganisms, uh, into a condominium where they have food, water, and cover? And then how do we get them down into the soil profile where they're gonna be safe and sound and, and continue to grow inoculate. So the, the other product that we're talking about is harmonize, um, highly unstable. Like if you leave this in a bucket for a day, maybe two, you're. Talking about water.

Right? Yeah. The liquid. Um, it's gonna go anaerobic because there's just so much what's called biological oxygen demand, b o d, because there's so much at going on in activity, they're stripping the dissolved oxygen out of that water at such a fast rate that it, it can't survive. And if it goes anaerobic, well now I've defeated my whole purpose. My purpose was to get minerals, nutrients, biology into the soil so that it could do its work.

And it was no longer mobile. In other words, if it rained, it didn't wash away. But if I go anaerobic, I've basically made a nutrient solution that's all the plant needs right there in that liquid, even though it smells like hell, if I pour it on that plant, the plant's gonna be able to take it up really quickly. But if it rains or I water, I've washed it all out of the profile. So I think that's the real missing piece is mobile or not mobile. What am I producing?

And my goal was always to produce non-mobile nutrients that in the form of biology that could be there for, as a nutrient bank for forever, for thousands of years. So that's again, the, the mechanical side of this is how to effectively and efficiently deliver this very sensitive biology down into a place where it is safe and it has food, water, and cover.

And if you are somebody like me who is very interested in a cold compost, but I'm not gonna do the mechanical aspects of this, it is also fabulous and way better than your thermal compost if you were to just make this cold compost pile and then make a compost tea with it and just pour it on your plants and get right to it. That's the, that's Essent essentially what we did, we made a compost extract,

not a tea. Like yeah, you could take this biological compost, throw it in your brewer, whether you put it in a bag or free brew it personally, I would free brew it. Um, which is basically just throw handfuls in there, bubble it for, uh, 30 hours. Again, we, we need to touch base on that, why that's such a critical point in time. Um, but now I've made a compost brew. So I've, I've taken a handful of this compost that I made.

The cold compost threw in a little bit of sugars. Again, it's, uh, you wanna make sure you're using, um, un sulfur black strap molasses, uh, no more than one ounce per 20 gallons. If you do use more, you're gonna raise the biological oxygen demand, b o d, and you're gonna have an anaerobic shit show. So you gotta eat very, very little bit of foods. You bubble it for 30 hours and then use it up by hour 36. The reason being is that between hour 20 and hour 24 is when you start to

get your high level of ProTool and production. In other words, you've provided the bacteria, you provided the deer. Now of a sudden the lions, the bears and the wolves are coming in and they're breeding like crazy because there's so much food in the source. And that's why it's critical that you wait till hour 30 so that you've had a good six to eight hours of high level of ProTool and production. Because at the end of the day, everybody's missing the protozoa.

It's all about the ProTool. We all have bacterially dominant soils. So what is the missing piece? Proto? They're the ones that are eating the bacteria and releasing that plant available. So the other point is that, yeah, if you just took this, uh, this cold compost and you threw it in some water and agitated it with your hands and then pour it on your plants, now you've basically made a compost extract with it.

So do you need the mechanical stuff? No, you can use your hands, but if you're gonna take the time to actually massage it with your hands for a period of time, wouldn't it have been easier? Or use a power drill. ? You know, so I, Go ahead. Yeah, no, I was gonna say, it's, it's all about delivery. How are you getting those organisms into the soil the most effective and efficient way? And I think the key to this is go ahead and make your cold compost pile. And once you have that,

there's a whole bunch of different ways that you can apply it. But, but we're encouraging you to make the pile and don't overheat it. And once you have that, you can do it the easy way, which is how I will be doing it, which is to take a, you know, a few handfuls and bubble it up for 30 hours and put it on your plants. You wanna take that further because, you know, maybe you're scaled and you want this to be available to you in a few months.

Well then go through more of the mechanical stuff, press out the water, and then you can, you can put that, um, that compost on the shelf and it will be ready for you when you need to use it in a few months. And you can use that water now. So, um, but, but really it's all about getting, getting that pile made and not having the pile get hot. I'm end of that dude. All right. It's all about in making ingredients.

One interesting footnote I would like to throw in here is that people will be astonished at all the unexpected benefits that come from using a, um, a biology rich cold compost. And the one example that I want to have, because it's really hard to say, Oh, my plant's color got so much better and, and oh, like, like, like the, the flowers were so good and oh my gosh, the flowers tasted better.

I felt like it had a wider terpene profile than I normally get. All that's true, but it's really hard to, to, to, to measure that. But what I can tell you is if you go back in, in the shaping fire Instagram, you know, we've got these, this four by four indoor bed that, um, you know, even though I'm using electricity for l e d lights, I'm trying to use regenerative techniques indoors, uh, it kind of has an experiment. Um, because, you know,

doing regenerative stuff indoors has got its own challenges. And so I, I did that and, um, I ended up with a, uh, fungus nat breakout for whatever reason. And, um, and I'm like, you know, I, I'm talking with my providers about the beneficial insects I want and all this kind of stuff, and, and I call you to bitch cuz we're friends and we do that. And I'm like, ah, I got this situation. And you're like, Oh, let me send you up this cold, calm post, um,

that I've made and then bubble it up and port on your bed. And I'm like, I don't know. I don't understand how a, you know, a fricking compost tea is going to, um, you know, get rid of my nats. If anything, it's going to make the soil more wet and I'm gonna get more fungus nats. And you're like, Well, first of all, it's not a tea, it's an extract. And I'm like, Go. All right. And uh, and, and, and then, but then you said,

you said just do it. And I'm like, All right, well, I trust you enough. I just, you know, very often I will just do the stuff you say and, and, and then watch for the benefit. And then, and so that's what I did. And I'll be damned, it was like I, I, I, I made this and I put the five gallons of it. Um, first I, I, I, uh, sprayed it on the top, so I made sure that I got all the top areas,

but then I just kinda like poured the rest in. And, um, you know, I was, I had no fungus nats within 48 hours I was flabbergasted. And I called you and I'm all like, What kind of sorcery is this? And, and, and how did you explain it to me? , it is sorcery, not . Um, basically what you did was you threw down a bunch of hungry microbes, uh, and with a food source of, of fungal larvae, uh, fungal nat larvae all over the place. So they just went to town, it was like buffet time.

So yeah, so, so the, the predators essentially that were in this highly inoculated extract, they went and they ate all the laal of the, of the fungus nats. And like, I never even considered that approach to fungus Nats. And it worked nearly instantly and was like, you know, very economical to do. Um, but that is just an example I want to give folks for, you know, once you start, I mean, we all love the microbes, right? And we all believe in imo and we all believe in using nature as our ally,

but this is kind of next level. Um, and I encourage folks to, to, to go do it. So, all right, so, uh, in, in, in bringing us kind of like to a close here, Layton, you know, we, we, we talked about, you know, what kinds of compost or things that are called compost are available to us. And, and we talked about what those options were like, and, and, and some of 'em, like Verma, vermaculture compost, we fricking love and,

and some of it like the bag stuff we don't really love. Um, but, but the one thing was that we wanted to encourage folks to not heat their piles. And so, so people go ahead and they, they, they, they don't heat their piles. They're using clean, non pathogenic, um, green materials and browns and, and, and then they, and they have this and they make it. And so now they've got what, what is going to be the nature of the pot container or the soil if you're going right in the ground?

Kind of bring us home here by describing the nature of the soil after this application versus the nature of their soil before the application. And we'll end with this. Okay? Uh, that's probably the whole point of this conversation is soil aggregate. Um, that's the reason you use compost. Um, and that's the reason we use microbes is because they actually form, um, aggregation. And what is aggregation? Aggregation is like a little clump of sandil and clay and organic matter.

Um, inside that clump is, is waterfalls and, and ponds and cities and walkways and parks and all kinds of different creatures and organisms, um, considered a zoo. And so inside that, in, and it's in this article that talks about the magic that the bio geochemical reactions that are happening inside that aggregate. Um, it's, we don't have tools to measure this yet. We don't have the technology to test it or monitor it or actually

scope it in situ. Um, there is a new instrument that, that was invented, I believe last year, that is a microscope that you push into the soil and you can leave it there for, for days, weeks, to monitor this shit. Um, those are the kinds of tools that we're gonna need to really advance our understanding on how valuable soil aggregates are. And aggregates are a combination of fungi, bacteria, protozoa, um, the physical side of it, as well as the chemical side of it. It is the,

is the, is the triple threat. It's the physical, the chemical and the, and the biological coming together. And that's why the aggregates are so important. Again, aggregates. Let the oxygen down, lets the CO2 out, back up to the plants. It holds water. Um, it allows, uh, water to infiltrate, um, into the soil so it's not just running off and creating erosion. So aggregation is, is the, the critical foundation to soil health. You can't have aggregates without good biology. It doesn't exist.

You have, you have compacted soil because you don't have the biology, but once you have the biology and the organic matter in play, you will begin to form aggregates. So again, that's why I went through this whole process of vibrating shit and elec, uh, exciting the electrons so they will form these aggregates extremely quickly.

That's the whole purpose of taking this biological compost and, uh, manufacturing it, for lack of better words, um, so that you're getting a faster response, um, in, in building the soil health and building those aggregates. Fabulous. So, you know, it's, it's not lost on me. And I, I think this is one of the reasons why, as I learned more about cold compost extracts, why I kept on pursuing this until I figured out what this was enough to do a show about it.

I really think that this is the future of regenerative farming. I think that, you know, thermal compost has been a great tool for the times. Um, but we are sophisticated enough now to know how to work with the microbes and to know that, you know, our biggest role is to a, stop fucking killing all the microbes and then second, you know, add microbes and help them, help incubate them and make more of them as much as possible.

Because we're not really the ones that are gonna clean up the mess we've made. It's really the microbes that are. And so if we are dedicating ourselves to not only working within the natural forces of the earth, but also to play our role to maximize them, I think that's the only direction that makes sense. Agreed. A hundred percent. I mean, we've, we've learned how to break shit down now.

We gotta learn to put things back together again, the way nature would've through biomimicry and not, not through our ego if, for lack of better words. I think, I think that is the best word, man. Layton, thank you so much. You know, um, I always appreciate you, um, you know, both our friendship and then having you on this show, but this was extra special today. And, um, I, I appreciate you sharing these,

these insights. Some of them pretty damn revolutionary . And, um, and also, you know, slogging through three hours of this, I'm, I'm exhausted. I'm not even the one that was talking. So, um, so thank you so much, man. I, I really appreciate you. Oh, I appreciate you too, Shango. You've been doing a lot of hard work for many years and you bring a very important message to, to the community as well as the general population as a whole.

And so it's an honor, it's a pleasure for me to, uh, be able to share what I've learned in my experiences with you and, and your audience. So thank you. Right. On. So if you want to, uh, follow along with, uh, latent's exploits, there are two ways to do that. Um, the first way is, uh, on Instagram. Uh, you can follow his Instagram profile at Kingdom Aquaponics llc. And I'll tell you straight up,

like he's not a huge social media guy cuz he is usually filthy in the field. Um, but he, he does post stuff to, um, the Instagram. It is always interesting. And when he goes on tours, you'll find all that stuff and, you know, if, if you have some reason you wanna reach out, um, he does check his Instagram messages. So, so that's Kingdom Aquaponics llc. And then also, uh, you could also find latent every Thursday, uh, co-hosting his own show on the Future Cannabis Project on YouTube.

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