Preparing Soil Samples
Preparing soil samples for microscope analysis is easy. The actual analysis has a steep learning curve. It takes a bit of practice. Preparing soil samples is different than preparing compost tea and compost extract samples. In preparing soil samples we are going to be measuring the amounts of micro-0rganisms contained in the soil. That means [...]
Preparing Extract Samples
Preparing compost extract samples is the easiest sample to make. It is identical to makeing compost tea samples. You do not need to ratio water with the tea. The down side is you really can’t tell how much of each animal is in the tea. When testing for compost teas, you are really looking for [...]
Soil Test Equipment
Testing your won soil with a microscope is fun, but there is a large learning curve. It is simple to make the samples, but identifying the animals on the slides takes a lot of practice. Here is a list of items you need for basic microscope soil analysis. These items can be used for analyzing compost, [...]
Testing Confocal Microscope on Compost Tea
Here is an interesting test case of compost tea made this week. The tea was brewed with protists and fungi in mind. The tea was made in a 5 gallon bucket with 4 tablespoons of liquid kelp and 4 tablespoons of fish hydrogisate. It was bubbled for 48 hours at 68 degrees F. Below is [...]
Foiloir Layer Case Study – Laurel Bay Leaf Images
The sample is set up with two different stains. One stain shows all of the live bacteria (green) and the dead bacteria (red). Below is the BL (Back Lite) of the Bay leaf. The stomata are shown in semi-bright circles in this image. A stoma is a pore, found in the leaf and stem epidermis [...]
Preparing Tea Samples
Preparing compost tea samples is the easiest sample to make. You do not need to ratio water with the tea. The down side is you really can’t tell how much of each animal is in the tea. When testing for compost teas, you are really looking for life diversity and the general inventory of animals [...]