Rabbit poop is here to stay!

[nivek]

@Weaselcracker needs to be readin this,, cheers

 

[Budsbunny]

The first batch of tea (and only one until now) that I made, I did that in a way that YOU should not be doing it. I took half a yogurt container of droppings and filled it with warm water. It was a very dark and high concentrate, so I threw it all in 3 liters of warm water. After that I had to run it through a dedicated stainless sieve and now that 3 liter bucket is standing in my kitchen (Just got a serious warning from my girlfriend…..)

So here is the plan for now, if you have a great or different idea, do not hesitate to bring that up in this post.

• I will fill a 5 gallon bucket with 4 gallons of water, put droppings in an old pillow case and soak that in the bucket for some time. When you take out the pillow case, it will work as a sieve and the remaining dropping in the pillow case you can throw in your garden as fertilizer or make some compost. (and maybe put your plants in?)
• When I think it is done, I will transfer it in a water cooler jug, it has a spigot so it will be easy to take out some tea concentrate.
• An alternative for the spigot is using a marinade injector, it has a scale on it, probably easy if you want to dilute it. In that case I could keep the concentrate in a bucket, it would be a cheaper solution as the water cooler jug is expensive and the injector is an accurate and clean way to dose.

 

[Budsbunny]

If you guys need any supplies.....here in Canada the Home depot is closing for public, today is the last day that they are open and probably this is the beginning of many other stores to follow.

 

[Budsbunny]

April 4, 2020

These are seedlings, just sprouted Jimmy Nardello peppers, the picture was taken March 4

Since 6 days or so, I give them tea as well, you can almost see them grow. Lol, not literally of course but it sure makes a difference, green, healthy and strong.

 

[lazylathe]

@Budsbunny

Thank you for starting this thread!
I remember chatting to you in another thread of your about bunny poop!
I have a lot at hand, the only problem is I need to get outside before my dogs do, those buggers just Hoover it up!
It's like a treat for them!

I will start collecting whatever I do see around the yard and start drying it out.
The rabbits are coming out in droves into the yard once the dogs are asleep.

Do you know how long it lasts once dried and stored?
I presume I will crumble it up and store in an air-tight ziplok bag for use in my winter grow.

Very keen to follow along with you!

 

[Budsbunny]

@Budsbunny

Thank you for starting this thread!
I remember chatting to you in another thread of your about bunny poop!
I have a lot at hand, the only problem is I need to get outside before my dogs do, those buggers just Hoover it up!
It's like a treat for them!

I will start collecting whatever I do see around the yard and start drying it out.
The rabbits are coming out in droves into the yard once the dogs are asleep.

Do you know how long it lasts once dried and stored?
I presume I will crumble it up and store in an air-tight ziplok bag for use in my winter grow.

Very keen to follow along with you!

Hi lazylathe, do I understand you correct that your dogs are eating rabbit droppings? Maybe you could create a dedicated place with a clean hard surface and put a bit of food, like lettuce leaves or so (where your dogs can't access) and vacuum the droppings with a hand vacuum like a Dyson.

The droppings I use are about 1.5 years old are just dried in open air, I just have them like that, no need to collect and store for a long time. I don’t think putting them in an air-tight ziplock bag is a good idea, just throw them in an open bucket after collection. Rabbit manure is a “cold manure” you don’t really need to compost it first like other manures.

And you don’t need to crumble it up as well, it is less work not to do so and easier and cleaner to handle as droppings. If you want to make a tea, just put them in a bag and drop them in water, the bag will act as a filter when you take it out again. I use droppings also in my garden, some people just put droppings around the plant on the soil and water during the season, myself, when plants are out of the soil at the end of the season I put dropping in the soil where plants will be next year, it is like making compost pre-season and worms just LOVE droppings in soil.

There is A LOT of food that is bad for rabbits, more that you think, rhubarb for instance is almost like poison for them, if you want to feed them in nature, it is best to take some of the stuff that they eat in your garden I guess.

 

[Budsbunny]

April 5, 2020

I have a rotating garden (modified clothes dryer) in which I experiment with growing a few girls. I am not going into this any further as I have a separate thread about that. To make a long story short, nine days ago I added some “bunny tea” as extra nutrients in my reservoir and as it looks the plants in flower react very well on that. I added the tea “on a feeling” but today I will make a new batch and measure the dose so I can keep better track of the results for the future.

Just wanted to show you some results “further on the road”.

These girls are rather small but that is another story. For now, it is the development of the buds that matter.
Stay safe!

 

[bluenoserjoe]

Really cool that this poop thread has created so much interest. I have a friend who also raises rabbits , been doing it for years so literally tons of manure in all stages of decompose. I think after reading this I will be using it for an outdoor grow this summer. Problem being, getting it here during these trying times. Very interested in the results, keep up the interesting experimentation.

 

[Budsbunny]

April 5, 2020

The first side effect of the tea is showing I guess, leaves start to curl a bit with that plant in R-DWC. Plant looks healthy and leaves are nice green for the rest. It is drinking a lot and the ppm went up from 5.6 to 6.2

Ph going up never happens normally with using only Masterblend, it stays always the same and to be honest, they normally drink a bit less. I topped the batch to a better level and Ph is now 5.6 again. I also have decreased the light intensity a bit.

What can I say……we live by the day…..

However, no visible problems with the little clone in rabbit based soil. I am not used to grow in soil and am afraid of over-watering if I am not carefull.

 

[Budsbunny]

Off topic but funny.....nobody will come near you....

 

[lazylathe]

@Budsbunny

The wild rabbits are free to eat anything in my yard that they like. Mostly grass, flowers, vegetables etc...
Lately they have been out during the day under the bird feeder, eating spilled food.
I would never feed them anything toxic! We love our wild bunnies and even nursed a few week old one back to health after my dog caught and injured it.
From baby with eyes and ears closed

To fully grown and ready to mingle with the bunny ladies! We released him in a place that has a lot of bunnies.

Also found a local guy that sells 50lb bags for $10!
Win/Win!

 

[Budsbunny]

@Budsbunny
Also found a local guy that sells 50lb bags for $10!

Buying droppings saves you a lot of work, 50lb will serve you for many years to come.

I sold yesterday 1 liter of concentrate for $8 through Facebook lol.
Bottle on one side of the driveway, the money on the other side, we had to laugh while doing it. She said friends of her might be interested also, told her for recommending 3 friends of her I would give her a bottle for free. Have to find a way to get 1 ltr bottles now.

 

[Budsbunny]

April 6, 2020

I might have been wrong (happens all the time says my girlfriend… ) with saying that the curling of the leaves is a side effect from the tea. Looking back at some pictures I saw that the curling was happening already before dosing the tea for the first time, so that is not it.

Maybe it was the light, some of you might not know, but I use normal led household bulbs as grow lights, see picture. I was using some cones with mirror film on it attached to these bulbs (not in the picture any more) that almost tripled the light density, I took them off yesterday, curling is at least not getting worse, leaves still have a good color and the plant still grows well.

Ph mystery of the rabbit tea.

Yes, this is a bit of a mystery.

• The tea concentrate I use to dilute a batch has a Ph. of 7.5 (the tap water I use to make the concentrate has a Ph. of 7.4)
• When I make the batch, including some H2O2, the tea and Masterblend, I end up with a Ph. of 6.5 - 6.8
• I bring the Ph. down to 5.6 with Advanced Nutrients Ph-down
• 4 hours later yesterday the Ph. was 6.5 again.
• This morning the Ph. was still 6.5
• In the past, when I used only Masterblend, and after bringing the Ph. down to 5.6. the Ph. in the bucket never went up again, maybe 0.1 point but that's it.
• I need 3x as much Ph. Down with the tea, as with using only Masterblend to go to Ph. 5.6

The roots however grow like crazy and look healthy, so does the plant, see picture. (turned off the air stone for the picture)

I made a new batch for my rotating garden yesterday with a Ph. of 5.6, the batch has 10X the tea strength of the batch above and this morning the Ph. was also 6.5
It is as if the tea locks the Ph. into a certain value and keeps it there.

For the clone in soil, I don't bring the Ph. down when at 6.5 or so and that plant is doing fine as well.

To be continued....

 

[lazylathe]

@Budsbunny

Have you been able to find out how much of a buffer rabbit poop provides when mixed with water?
This sounds like the issue you are facing when trying to lower the pH.

 

[Budsbunny]

@Budsbunny

Have you been able to find out how much of a buffer rabbit poop provides when mixed with water?
This sounds like the issue you are facing when trying to lower the pH.

What do you mean with "how much of a buffer"?

 

[lazylathe]

What do you mean with "how much of a buffer"?

A buffer is a substance that resists changes. It seems to me as if the rabbit poop has some sort of buffer that resists your changes and reverts back to what it wants to be.
Did a bit of reading and rabbit poop has a pH of around 8.5, so very alkaline.
I would say this is the reason your pH keep rising by itself.

 

[Budsbunny]

A buffer is a substance that resists changes. It seems to me as if the rabbit poop has some sort of buffer that resists your changes and reverts back to what it wants to be.
Did a bit of reading and rabbit poop has a pH of around 8.5, so very alkaline.
I would say this is the reason your pH keep rising by itself.

If I dilute the concentrate, the Ph. goes down to 7.4 If I bring the Ph more down than 6.5 it will come back to 6.5 but stays stable after that, no matter how much concentrate is in the batch. In my batch of the rotating garden, there is 10X more concentrate in the mix but that also stays stable at 6.5.
As long as all keeps going well, the 6.5 might be the new 5.5 for me lol.

 

[Modest Grower]

I skimmed through a bit but will go back and read through. On the curling do you know what your humidity is? My current plants were curling a bit and I think it was low humidity. I also forgot my fan turned off I'm a power outage so air wasn't circulating. I increased the humidity to around 60% in veg/preflower and turned the fan back on and the droopy plants were reaching. Just some things to check as possibilities I suppose. Cute wild bunnies!

 

[Budsbunny]

I skimmed through a bit but will go back and read through. On the curling do you know what your humidity is? My current plants were curling a bit and I think it was low humidity. I also forgot my fan turned off I'm a power outage so air wasn't circulating. I increased the humidity to around 60% in veg/preflower and turned the fan back on and the droopy plants were reaching. Just some things to check as possibilities I suppose. Cute wild bunnies!

Thank you Modest grower, the RH is at 52%, I would be able to bring that up a bit, but probably it is the (too low) temperature, which is at 18C / 65F right now. I think the (maybe too strong) exhaust fan is sucking cold air from the basement into the dresser that is my "grow room". I will see what I can do about that, if I can increase the temperature, the RH will go a bit up again as well.
Thanks again for your comment, I was too focused on the rabbit stuff that I forgot to look for anything else.

 

[Budsbunny]

April 7, 2020

This is the little clone in the army chest, you see the growth of 3 days after starting with the rabbit tea. It is “cold” in this chest as well, if I am able to increase the temperature I assume it will go better. The bigger leaves are a bit more upwards now.

Important changes in the water/rabbit ratio will come once I get the temperature a bit up.