Could Wort Serve as a Viable Soil Amendment?

Progress report for FNC16-1061

Project Type: Farmer/Rancher
Funds awarded in 2016: $7,452.00
Projected End Date: 12/31/2018
Grant Recipient: Carriage House Farm
Region: North Central
State: Ohio
Project Coordinator:
Richard Stewart
Carriage House Farm
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Project Information

Summary:

Carriage House Farm has accumulated the infrastructure to manage the project and has a site that has been prepared.  The location of the plot, though not visible on this map is located here:  https://www.google.com/maps/@39.1520824,-84.7935533,417m/data=!3m1!1e3

Problems
The two partnering breweries for this project had massive issues in providing the large amount of wort we were requiring for the project. 

MadTree Brewing Company was a simple logistic issue of not being able to allow for the foot print of a 375 gallon IBC container.  This company had expanded its canned, distributed line of beers, requiring additional storage space originally intended for the container to collect wort.  Compounding this was both their expansion to a new space and the departure of our direct contact with the business leaving us in a state of confused communication for 90 days.

Rheingeist Brewery had odd problems that we are still unclear about.  They are the largest brewery we are working with and had introduced new systems of a scale that exceed our capacity to work with.   In the two attempts to pull the wort/waste liquid from their waste stream (cohabitated with their grains) the brewer found that the original system they had incorporated to remove liquid prior to the corkscrew press that they relied on to "dry" the spent grain for cattle feed was incorrectly plumbed resulting in a costly delay of production, causing work stoppage for 13 and 18 hours respectively.

These delays proved devastating for the first year of research.  The delay caused the planting of the peppers and basil plants used in the research to be pushed back to a date much later than intended and pushed the final yield and tissue tests so late as to be pressured by frost dates.

It was decided to delay and work with the breweries to correct the issues or if unable to correct, find alternative sources of wort from other breweries.

Solutions
We have been working with another brewery, Woodburn Brewery, and we feel that will be an excellent replacement for the larger Rheingeist.  MadTree Brewing will complete its relocation in February of 2018 and will be able to reliably work with Carriage House Farm in providing them wort.

Research Protocol Adjustment
The original grant proposal stated that we would water the plants regularly with various dilutions of wort (100%, 75%, 50%, and 25%). Chemical analysis of the wort indicated a higher N content than anticipated and a large range of N concentration (roughly 0.1% to 1.0% N). To account for this range in wort N levels and avoid potential nitrogen toxicity of all treated plants, we changed treatment concentration levels of wort to 100%, 10%, 1%, and 0.1% before applying it to the plants. Wort treatments were applied once per week at a rate of 0.5 gallons / ft.

2018 Timeline (Extension)

Spring - Plant New Soil Socks (Complete)
Collect Wider Range of Wort Samples - Ongoing
Spring-Summer - Irrigate and monitor
Summer-Autumn - Harvest, Record, Plant Tissues
Autumn - Compile Data
Autumn-Winter -Report
Winter 2019 - Lecture at OEFFA

Project Objectives:

Current/proposed objectives remain unmet.

  1. Test whether or not wort could easily and effectively be employed to convert low-yield, practically infertile soil to profitability in a sustainable and socially responsible way.
  2. Make use of wasted wort that would otherwise be sent to metropolitan sewage systems, at a cost to brewers and the environment.
  3. Share results through local food education initiatives, magazine article, university extension services, and social media. 

 

Cooperators

Click linked name(s) to expand/collapse or show everyone's info
  • Justin Dean
  • David Schweitzer
  • Matt Willman

Research

Materials and methods:

Research Protocol Adjustment
The original grant proposal stated that we would water the plants regularly with various dilutions of wort (100%, 75%, 50%, and 25%). Chemical analysis of the wort indicated a higher N content than anticipated and a large range of N concentration (roughly 0.1% to 1.0% N). To account for this range in wort N levels and avoid potential nitrogen toxicity of all treated plants, we to changed treatment concentration levels of wort to 100%, 10%, 1%, and 0.1% before applying it to the plants. Wort treatments were applied once per week at a rate of 0.5 gallons / ft.

Research results and discussion:

Impacts

None as of yet.

Accomplishments

Better understanding of the complexities when dealing with brewers.  Both brewers had every intent to work with us, but business growth with both companies we had planned to work with interrupted our initial attempt to secure wort to use as a source of nutrients for the test plants.

New brewery has been located and groundwork laid for upcoming 2018 trials.

Participation Summary
1 Farmers participating in research

Educational & Outreach Activities

3 Other educational activities: Social Media posts using photo documentation and cross linking to SARE and USDA.

Learning Outcomes

Lessons Learned:

To date, the amount of nitrogen contained within wort far exceeded the amount predicted and adjustments were made to the project to compensate.

100% wort resulted in 100% nitrogen toxicity of all plants in test plot 1.

Complete results will be released the first quarter of 2019.

Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture or SARE.