Johnson Su Bioreactor Compost Results! Successes And Challenges!
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 7 ก.ย. 2024
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Having watched your first video a year ago when you assembled this, I'm very grateful that you posted this follow-up on the results. In being humble enough to confess your mistakes, you've probably saved about 1000 people a year of their lives in potentially repeating your mistakes. Think about that: You probably saved 1000 years of waste. Since viewers can now pay extra attention to avoid the pitfalls you experienced, they are going to save a LOT of heartache, and maybe do this right on the first try. At age 55, saving a year really means a lot to me. Your sacrifice of humility is not lost on us! Thanks!
Thank you, I appreciate it. Glad I can help. I will always be truthful.
Yeah this is a really great video but I'm not sure what mistakes we're made.. The temperature dropped below freezing and the area suffered a drought.. Yeah you can store in greenhouse/ keep the irrigator going but yeah anyways it's a great video
@@scottstevens7253 Thanks
if you take a note from mushroom growers, let it colonize about 20% and then mix it up. it'll repair and inoculate the dead spots to an overall faster total colonization time. seems like this should be applicable to compost
Saprotrophic fungi (like the kinds that break down woody, or leafy debris) are not generally the same ones that form mycorrhizal networks.
With about 15 seconds of research, you could "hear" it too.
As a mushroom grower I see little to no fungal activity. If i were you poke holes in the exterior and inoculate the pile with oyster mushrooms and you will get free edible mushrooms and they will break down the pile into compost.
It is already breaking down. Larger mushrooms would help it work quicker potentially. There are numerous mycelium on the interior.
Thanks for the update Eric.
Our house and garden area (plus our entire property) was / is all forest. Thankfully we have a local nursery where we can buy many different types of top soils, bark, gravel, etc.
We had to have them deliver 10 yards of topsoil after we got our raised beds (we built retaining walls into the side of the Mtn so our garden will be flat).
We have 2 compost piles. The first one is small, (4 posts surrounded by chicken wire).
We built a larger one with 4X4 pallets (1 pallet on each side to make a square) and lined the inside with chicken wire to help hold everything between the slats in the pallets.
The topsoil doesn’t have a lot of nitrogen so in the spring we use pot ash and when our burn season comes to an end , we buy 2 bales of Alph Alpha and put it over our garden between the plants, then water.
The nitrogen really does well for our (my wife’s) flowers and our vegetables.
Thanks again for the update!
The fact that you have ants in there suggests that it is too dry. Dr Johnson says the moisture should be maintained at 70% for the duration. That is pretty wet, just short of water dripping out the bottom.
If you looked, the bottom was wet. That is where the ants were....in the moist portion. I did state in the video that it was difficult to maintain proper water saturation and I was not able to hold that saturation level for the duration the compost was developing.
70% is indeed a lot of water, thanks re. moisture keeping ants out it was a major concern they will attack earthworms.
sometime soon we will have a clever fellow make a fully autonomous reactor.
Can I make suggestions, firstly you need to use more air points at least 4 or 5 plastic pipes or modified wire as you placed, having more pipes allows air to flow more efficiently through the whole reactor, the so at some point you can pull them out. Secondly it needs to be higher to get the heat into the system at the beginning, I mean the volume of material.It looks like it was still working being smaller and only having one airflow point.
Weather conditions well can’t be changed for you area😊
Get yourself a microBiometer Starter kit for your own ongoing monitoring. Really affordable
I have been making leaf mold for several years now in south central WI. I insulate my leaf mold bin with bagged leaves which keeps most of the bin around 40F throughout the winter. I am going to do a Johnson-Su reactor this spring, planning on wrapping the exterior with gutter heat tape and also insulate with bagged leaves, hopefully to keep everything breaking down throughout the winter.
Looking under the microscope I find a fungal dominated product with my leaf mold, really excited to see what the finished product from a Johnson-Su compost looks like.
The more I've been looking at materials, I think I am going to stay away from much in the form of a nitrogen component. I have seen too many of these going anaerobic when a lot of nitrogen was used.
Have a few videos out there, one on how I had to construct my leaf mold bin to keep Asian jumping worms out.
Enjoy your videos! Stay Well!!!
Thanks for sharing Brian. Those sound like good modifications. Let me know how the heat tape works out.
I am going to stay away from almost all nitrogen sources too.
I only used corn silage. This silo, due to improper storage, began to heat up in the heap and it turned out to be unsuitable for animals. But it came in handy for my compost Johnson-Su. I have winter for six months of the year. Therefore, I carefully transferred the layers of compost (in the summer it was in the reactor) into boxes and put everything in a large plastic barrel at home. The microscope showed that after four months of such storage, the compost remained mushroom.
The resulting compost is now used for dilution with water and watering persimmon pots and vegetable seedlings. It is much more effective than ordinary compost collected in the forest.
@@scout7060 I hear it is, the only problem the Johnson-Su should not be allowed to freeze either.
That is one reason I want to give it a try, to see if there is much of a difference under the microscope.
Stay Well!!! Spring is coming!
Living soils are alive and the process keeps going after you have added the compost to your garden. The fast compost is bacterially dominated, but a lot of what people think is fungal activity in their compost is actinomyces, a bacterium. If you put organic matter into the soil and you keep your soil from compacting, being tilled, or drying out you create a welcoming environment for fungal growth.
I'm gonna have to figure out how to set something like this up that isn't an eye sore. That way I have wife's approval. BTW, everyone, if you mimic this set up consider making space for a drip tray. The water run off is compost tea. Good for the plants.
Great follow-up video, but I have doubts... The 'reactor' is just another way to make leaf mold. Now leaf mold is a great soil amendment, but I don't think it's superior or any more 'healing' to soil than compost. Organic matter of any kind feeds the soil food web. I'd also point out that Jesse Frost (no till) and Charles Dowding (no dig) both have market gardens/farms with amazing results using just compost, of just 2-4" on top of beds.
I know your video is 1 year old, but as an applied microbiologist let me tell you (friendly comment) that (a) oxygen or aeration and (b) mixing (once a month or two months) are the two main drivers for the composting process to operate at full rate!
Bacteria and fungi are both necessary and involved into the composting process.
Suggestion: as you, I operate one composting bioreactor of 1 cubic meter (3’ x 3’ x3’) ; I mix it every other month; I feed it with our food left overs and garden clips; but IMPORTANTLY my open bioreactor made of wooden palette is « installed » under the branches of a cedear tree, which provides shade in the summer. I rarely need to spray water. And during a heavy rainfall it is not flooded!
Good luck with your system !
Thank you. I appreciate it. I did try to follow Dr. Johnson's method as closely as I could. have you seen his research and lectures? His are never turned and the oxygenation comes from the tubes/holes he places in the initial pile.
Dr. Johnshon soaks the ingredients, before loading. Do you think that had any impact? Not sure it did, but it's what came to mind. Keeping it from freezing would be really, really difficult - not sure how most of us would manage that
No, I don’t think it made a difference. I kept it moist at the beginning of the process….but like I mentioned I was not able to keep up the moisture leading to a longer process.
There was no way for me to keep it from freezing. Most won’t be able to.
it makes sense that ants actively cultivate fungus, since there is some fungus that kills ants. Hence they want the beneficial ones for them to thrive.
I dont buy into the dont disturb mycelium. Look up how mushrooms are grown, you break up the grain spawn with a tiny bit of mycelium growing on it and it distributes it around and in 2 days it starts growing again each little piece of mycelium then starts to grow, you break it up to make it grow on all the spawn FASTER. Also you need fruiting bodies to have spores.
I’m just going to walk a few feet from my garden and collect some of the soil in the forested area of my property. I can collect what nature has done over the years in minutes.
That will work if you have that resource
I'd get rid of the pallet and put directly on the ground so worms can migrate into the compost. To keep air movement, I'd lay perforated pipes on the ground and build the pile on top.
Otherwise, Johnson says add ~100 red wigglers on top after ~1 month (when pile cools). Vermicomposting significantly speeds up the process.
Do whatever suits you best.
Johnson said add wigglers after 3 to 4 days.
If you are doing the actual Johnson -Su process you have to have it above the soil level.
I liked your idea about a single column . However after seeing this i am going to go with multi columns. Also i am going to use a solar pump drip irrigation to keep tha moisture level up
Thank you for taking the time to show us your results. I’ve been studying the Johnson-Su bioreactor and have been experimenting with what materials I’ve had on hand. It still needs some tweaking. I did not know that it wasn’t supposed to freeze, so this partially explains the less than ideal results of my own bin.
I’ve been developing compost for some years and I have yet to see one reach a high temperature. An extremely well-read, old and wise gardener, who is literally a genius, told me that it needs to be somewhere around 3.5 feet deep and contain enough moisture to heat it up. I’ve been wondering about how this would work with the Johnson-Su bioreactor, since it requires airflow at 1.5’ intervals. Like you, I’m no scientist.
By the way, has anyone ever told you that you have a Hollywood double? Ryan Eggold (starring a hit man on The Blacklist) could easily pass as your twin brother.
Thanks. I get the Ryan Eggold thing a lot (and some other dude from Walking Dead).
I had a commenter from Canada remark that his still worked when it froze. I gotta go with the research from the originator of the bioreactor, Dr. David Johnson since he is the scientist. The heating should only last for a few days and since this is aerobic, it is not using heat for the process. There are very few nitrogens in these bioreactors normally.
@@CountryLivingExperience I throw just about everything in it except for the kitchen sink, aged horse manure, leaves, grass, table scraps, lots of coffee grounds, etc. My first round had already been composting in a pile for maybe a year before I threw it in the bioreactor that I put together, which was sometime in the late summer of last year. I watered it well for the first month or two. It's a large cube, around 5' x 5' x 4'. The air chambers appeared to have collapsed over the winter.
I had the same problem on my first pile the air holes collapsed my second and third pile I added the finest wire mess I could find and wrapped it around my pvc pipes with holes drilled in the pvc pipe when the heat went down I pulled out the pvc pipes leaveing the wire mesh behind went through the winter and is almost a a year and half old and the holes are still there I’m going to let this one sit for over two years and see how long the mesh keeps the air holes open
theden-jimdill7037 I live in southern Ontario and my piles freeze but come back to life every spring the way I see it is any biology in the pile is local and will adapt to winter even though it freezes my piles still break down fast only thing I do in he winter I add a foot of chopped leaves to insulate the piles and in the spring I pull back the leaves and see tons of red wiggles devouring the leaves I wouldn’t worry about it freezing
get yourself microBiometer starter kit for ongoing monitoring yourself. Really affordable
Thank you very much for explaining all of this. That is very interesting.
You're welcome
Excellent and simply narrated.
Thank you kindly!
You should be able to send the soil in to a university for sample free or very cheap testing
There's a bird species that uses compost to warm its eggs, could you do something similar with this reactor? Like surround it with a heat producing compost? That might also be a solution for watering, if you can somehow catch the vapor and condense the water passively, like with plastic sheeting or something. Just brainstorming here. I really like the idea of farming soil itself. It seems obvious like you said, we spend too much time fussing over plants and growth when if you just make an epic medium growth happens without much effort.
I have never heard of that bird species so I am not sure. Yes, just make an epic rich beautiful medium and you will have good results.
Thank you for sharing this. Very interesting. I've been wanting to build one of these.
You're welcome. We have a video on how to build one too.
@@CountryLivingExperience I think I saw you build that composter. I'll watch it again. God bless you and your family.
Thank you brother 🙏
You're welcome
I'm wondering if leaving the big vent in the middle allowed it to dry from the inside as well as the outside, drying out your pile too quickly between waterings
Potentially. I would have to experiment.
I would have expected much more settling/reduction in a well functioning system
I mentioned that my system had setbacks. If it was running how it should, it would have reduced more.
Thoughts on adding biochar to this mix? Being carbon based it should work well in this system and help it hold nutrients. Mimicking an old growth forest, forest fires are a healthy part of nature
I have never tried it. Give it a shot. Biochar is good for microbial growth and harboring. Since this is mostly fungal, I am not sure of the impact.
hi, this is so cool i like the idea of a fungal dominant compost. do you think if you had added some sugar and oats to this like one or 2 of those entire cylinders of it in layers maybe the fungus would have more to eat at first? or is there a reason not to do that? thx cool vid im def making one if to innoculate my biochar alone. ty
The leaves and woodchips are enough. Oats will attract rodents.
Very useful information. Thanks
You're welcome
Worms are added after the compost cools down according to Johnson-Su. This could be why it’s not finished yet. Too bad your worms left due to winter temperatures.
I know. I didn’t say I added them before the thermophyillic phase was over. It was the moisture regulation as I stated.
my concern with adding worms after it’s cooled is that they may not have enough to feed on, so maybe some greens or ruminant manures added initially will feed them . ?
You mentioned somewhere in the comments here that you will make a Compost Tea extract from this. What do you do with the solids that are left over after you make the tea? I love your smaller design and am planning to build a couple like this this spring.
I just throw the rest of the solids in the garden. It is still a good growing medium when mixed with the other soils.
Why do Mushrooms grow in Clumps ?
Because their isn't Mushroom !
But I'm a Fungi, with a Heart of Mold,
and these Jokes are in Spore taste !
(Heart of Mold - my addition)
I have a tone of organic matter but It would take me forever to chip it all up with the chipper shredder. If I just fill it with chucky organic matter what do you suppose the fungal species count would be, half or less than half? What would you guess for the fungal spore count half or less than half? Just give it your best guess.
thanks for the follow up.
You're welcome
Missed your Sparty hat in today's video. Especially considering recent events.
Thanks
Thank you.
You're welcome
How about digging a 2 ft x 2 ft pit and cover it with dry leaves in winter ?
Wouldn’t get the proper airflow for this type of compost
Would there have been less freezing, if the holes had been smaller and more of them, as in the original design?
No, not at all.
Weed fabric significantly reduces oxygen passthrough. Are there any better alternatives? Maybe burlap?
This is what Dr. Johnson uses so I trust that. You can change it if you like.
What about putting a layer of insulation around the outside of the reactor?
That would work for freezing but would restrict the air flow.
This seems like an awesome composter. QUESTION. I’m brand new to studying soil. The first book I just read on it said fungal soils are ideal for trees whereas bacteria in soil is better for gardens. The book is called “Teaming with Microbes” by Jeff Lowenfels…but this seems different than what you are saying here. Thoughts on this? Thx
That is partially true in my opinion. All plants need both. Forests usually have more decaying organic matter in the form of leaves and branches which means they will have a naturally more fungal soil. However, fungally dominated composts will heal a soil faster and more completely than bacterial dominant. It would be used initially to heal then use bacterial.
What if you leave a pile of leaves in your garden? Will this compost with fungi and improve the soil?
They will help the soil if you can keep them in place. They also don't break down quite like the bioreactor.
How bout doing it underground, like burying it , wouldn't that solve the temperature and moisture issue?
Interesting thought. I do not know honestly. I have never experimented doing that. Mine is working, it is just a bit slower than optimal conditions.
any issues with filling it up over time? I don't have enough material to fill the reactor all at once unfortunately but have been adding carbon (leaves/cardboard shreds) as it becomes available.
You need to start with a big amount for the reactions and processes to really work well. I have gone as far as to drive around the nice city neighborhoods looking for bagged leaves by the curbside.
What are your average climate Temps, precip etc throughout the different seasons where you are located? Where are you located. Thank you 😊
We are in zone 8b in East Texas
Great video,💪👍🏻
Thank you.
Why not put the bioreactor in a high tunnel or greenhouse?
My greenhouse is not really heated.
not saprophytic fungi.
check out dr. Johnsons comments.
Well i would just grow mushrooms on such a pile this will accelerate the fungal growth and wont take 1 yr.
😂
Fungal dominance and biodiversity is the desired end result of the Johnson-Su bioreactor. This is achieved by proper time, moisture, air, and undisturbed product so the fungus can develop to their optimum level.
what is the PH during the process?
Is it possible to introduce a forced air system? not high pressure, just as a supplement?
Give it a shot. I have seen some large systems like that in videos around TH-cam.
@@CountryLivingExperience so have I. But I am wondering about this specific bioreactor. Hmmmm. Thinking of trying it. Do a direct comparison side by side. See what happens
Vegetable gardens like the bacterial dominated soil and trees like the fungal Correct?
No, that is not correct.
That is what a lot of homesteading or permaculture folks are saying
@@CountryLivingExperience
Every living plant needs both.
true @@CountryLivingExperience
Some plants grows better in bacteria dominant,so others do better in fungal dominant.However both could work better in a certain ratios per plant but nature will take care of it.
You could also just build a hoogle culture mound. Doesn't it do the same or have the same effect?
I would say no. There is no air getting to the logs in the Hugelkultur mound. So that process would be anaerobic and probably be bacterially dominated.
Nature doesn't bury vast amounts of wood deep underground (except in avalanches or catastrophic floods)
Nature initiates wood decomp on soil surface for maximum oxygen intake.
Huggelculture is backwards, imo
I have access to shrimp shells & guts from wild caught shrimp from the west coast of Mexico , I am in the midwest. Can I add them into the reactor? Can’t seem to find that answer?
No, that won’t work sorry.
When you use it for your soil, how will you apply it?
I will make a compost tea out of it then pour that tea along the seed/transplant lines the next time I sow.
I''ve watched some videos of folks who make the 18day compost and I have to say they seem to be having pretty good results after using the compost. How long will the bioreactor take to be able to use the finished material like 2yrs I'm guessing?
In ideal conditions, 1 year.
This is a different type of compost though. The fast 18 day composts and the like are bacterially dominated. They are good for short term nutrition and getting some microbiology back into the soil.
The Johnson Su produces fungally dominated compost. This compost heals soils long term and provides a fungal network for soil bacteria to travel on. It is vital for good soils.
I have a question. I was looking at trash can composting because my needs are much smaller than yours but one difference I noticed and don't understand is, why is yours isolated from the ground? Don't you want worms and other lifeforms to be able to get into it from underneath?
Mine is isolated because of grass and weed growth from below. Worms are inside. Trash can won't work for this method because it needs to breathe.
@@CountryLivingExperienceCan you make an update video about your thoughts on this method after using it for 2 years? Also, have you considered adding homemade biochar into the mix?
@@clashwithkeen I am happy with the results of this method. It creates some of the best soil amendment that I have ever used. I like biochar for my garden but I have not considered it for an addition to this method. I do not want to stray too far from the original that Dr. Johnson developed over years.
Dissing his neighbor’s hayfield. Oh snap!
Think I might give this a try , would like to see you do a jadam fertilizer video!
Cool
How do you know your soil needs this type of compost?
This type will heal almost all depleted soils.
How will you manage the ant infestation? That would be somewhat concerning.
I am no worried about it. They help to break down soil as well.
Why there is no mycelium network nor a single mushroom head somewhere on it?
Where? On yours?
A mycelium is a network of fungal threads or hyphae. Mycelia often grow underground but can also thrive in other places such as rotting tree trunks. A single spore can develop into a mycelium. The fruiting bodies of fungi, such as mushrooms, can sprout from a mycelium.
@@CountryLivingExperience Did you inoculate/homogenize the compost with mycelium/spores when you initially put it into the reactor? I didn't see any of the characteristic whiteness associated with a mycelial network. Also what specific fungi were you hoping to cultivate?
Did you forget to add the worms?
No. They left when the pile dried out and I was not providing moisture.
Do you add food scraps? Thank you.
Only a small bit. Less thank 10%
This kind of compost isn't going to produce the kind of fungi you want, as the kind of fungi you want will only grow in the presence of the living plants they depend on for nutrient exchange. Cold compost will more likely be inoculated with the kind of fungi that is independent of plants and will, instead, be consuming for itself the nutrients the symbiotic fungi would otherwise be providing to the plants. So you absolutely want your compost to go anaerobic to kill all the spores in it, so that you have clean material to put around your plants that symbiotic fungi can grow into in the presence of its preferred plant roots. Bottom line: cold compost is always bad compost.
You're wrong.
Half wrong. The fungi in a compost pile is saprophytic fungi. And doesn't directly partner with plants.
BUT they do indirectly benefit the plants by soulablizing nutrients.
You do want BOTH kinds of fungi in your soil.
Cold compost is not bad lol
@@indica_dogo868 Fungi and bacteria compete for the same nutrients, so you want the least amount of the less beneficial microbes that the habitat can sustain and the most of the ones you want. Symbiotic fungi and nitrifying bacteria are more valuable, particularly for annuals that most food gardens are composed of, than saprophytic fungi.
Do you have to turn the compost?
Not at all. That is one of the major points of this compost.
USB Microscopes are inexpensive and you can get good pictures on a computer.
Cool. I might look into that.
pff.. so complicated.. i was hope to do it simple!
Valuable things take hard work. Don’t be afraid of that.
❤️💖❤️💖🙏🙏💖❤️💖❤️
2:45 ,,this needs to remain anaerobic“? You probably made a mistake writing this. You sayed the opposite.
Actually no. It can be a bit confusing. It does need to remain anaerobic which means that the pile cannot have air mixed into it. So, if the pile of compost is mixed up frequently (or turned) then it would be aerobic with air mixing in. The pile must remain static.
@@CountryLivingExperience This statement is inaccurate. The whole J-S system is designed around the idea of keeping the biology aerobic...NOT anaerobic by making sure that no part of the pile is over 12 inches from an air source. That is the distance that air (and oxygen) can diffuse through your average compost pile. Anaerobic bacteria which thrive without oxygen would cause the pile to STINK. It isn't subtle. Your pile is aerobic, not anaerobic...although it isn't turned to bring in air.
I'm not trying to be obnoxious, but believe you need to understand this. I have to say that aside from this important point you have been one of the absolute BEST communicators out there that I've viewed.
Me again; as you replied to my comment, you ask me if I know Johnson and Su bioreactor?
I decided to go and read the original 2017 paper ( regenerationinternational.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Johnson-Su-Bioreactor.pdf)… interesting and informative. As a researcher (35+ years of lab and field RD projects), I have to ask you « what are you trying to achieve and at what scale and with how many man power »? For me, the system (pallet, tubes, mesh and tarp) appears to be « unnecessary complex » for a 12 month batch process that produces a clay-like compost material! Although I don’t dispute that it does the “job”, I argue that you may achieve similar results (mature compost) using a basic home-made composting unit.
Remember: at a scale 3’x3’x3’ (absolute minimum for heat to reach 60 oC as a result of microbial activity) or 10’x10’ (base) x6-8’ (hight) (human size, one that can be operated by one/two persons) you will not need tubes to favour air (oxygen) to reach the microbes. Time, water (as needed) and manual mixing will do as good !
Finally, personally, I operate two open-structure bioreactors (4’x4’ x3’ hight)… made of nice wooden pallets (3 sides) fixed one to another but “closed” with unfixed top and front panels. As they are not fixed, I can open them and have full easy access to the material inside the bioreactors! MIXING at the right time is the key step for the composting process.
If you wonder: I operate one bioreactor to feed our food scrap on a weekly basis or on demand to which I had also dry leaves, that I spared from the previous fall. I dig a hole for burying that food scrap right into the centre of the compost heap. No rodent; no visitors!!
Meanwhile, the second bioreactor is left untouched for 4 months for the compost to fully mature! At that time, I sieve my raw compost to remove the large clumps and branches. The resulting compost is used for gardening.
Good luck with your strategy but keep it simple, find a way to mix and wait long enough to get a fine compost material that will smell like a fresh humic soil and will be granular and non sticky!
Sorry if my English is not perfect but I tried to be as descriptive as possible.