Red Zinger = Brilliant Yellow Fertilizer

I think most of my readers know I use diluted urine as fertilizer. Well recently I have been drinking enormous amounts of Celestial Seasoning's Red Zinger tea. I love that stuff. Well, I don't know if it is just me, but Holy Moley that is some brilliant yellow! Looks like I have been drinking highlighter pen ink!

If you really want to see what color it is, I am almost ashamed to admit I actually took a picture of it before diluting it.

The Darkening...

Amending soil with rice hull charcoal

As you can see, the sandy soil in my garden is on the left. I put about 5cm of rice hull charcoal on the soil as you see on the top right, and mixed it in with my fingers and a small garden trowel (bottom right)
That is quite a bit darker. I am looking forward to see how it does with fava beans in it next month.

A friend of mine advises to soak the hulls in urine for a few days to let them get some nitrogen in them. What do you think?

Rice Update Sept. 07, 2011

Well, my diluted urine fertilizer test is working well. The color has really greened up, and the competing weeds are growing like crazy (That was not one of hoped for effects though).

Koshi Hikari rice, Takahagi, Ibaraki

You can see the heads are starting to get larger. I still only have about half the number of flowering stalks as the neighbors though. We'll see what happens. Harvest planned for beginning of October.