To Foam Or Not To Foam: Why Isn't My Tea Foaming? Is That Bad?

[LittleDabbie]

Ive noticed the more molasses i use the more foam i get, Ran 4 buckets each with the same style pumps and water just varying sugar contents and the one with the most molasses to 4 gallons of water went ape shit with foam ( good thing i kept the bucket inside a bin.. ) The one with the least molasses had little or no foam..

Dunno bout Alfalfa but im sure its about the same or causes more foam.

There is a few tricks for lids you can use that will just recycle the foam back into the water which is as seamaiden suggest the best option since that is food and all..

 

[G gnome]

Exactly what i have found as well.

 

[BrownTea]

Just wanted to drop a hello and say how great it is to have found you guys.
Been brewing in Austin, Tx since 2007, using 55 gal food barrels, and am only just getting started.

Here are a couple links to a micro vid from today's batch after 24 hrs. I am only getting started in identifying individual microganisms, so could be Listeria and Ebola for all I know, but the plants seem to like it. 60x objective with 20x eyepiece. Attempting youtube and google drive sharing links.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4OhMRbu70acWEJXWUNRWVhwV2c/view?usp=sharing

The photo below shows my record foam batch.
Thanks for all the great information! Keep it coming.

 

[Seamaiden]

Go to microbeman dot com, and buy his ID videos. You'll learn a LOT. Promise. :)

 

[BrownTea]

Go to microbeman dot com, and buy his ID videos. You'll learn a LOT. Promise. :)

Good stuff thank you so much Sea!
Also thank you for the three-fingers post, I was wondering about 3-lobed leaves.

 

[jumpincactus]

Well I see you all are discussing some tech that takes me back to my reef keeping days. As @Seamaiden mentioned what we are doing when we are brewing tea is creating a process called foam fractionator, in the aquarium biz the units are called "protein skimmers" but that term is misleading. Skimmers /fractionators are used to remove DOC (dissolved organic compounds) from the water. This is done due to the high water quality requirements for reef tank systems.

So based on my knowledge of this process I would say that the foam for our purposes is a GOOD thing. I always incorporate my foam in my tea. I want the DOC's as that is whats feeding the plant and the microbes. The amount of foam you are getting in your brew has to do with a couple of things, size of bubbles and contact time in the water column. I know this as fact, I when I first started brewing teas used to just allow the end of a aquarium pump just bubble large bubbles and never got much foam. Then I incorporated a venturi air valve into the mix which created micro bubbles and the damn thing foamed over. :D Why you say, because in actuality the smaller bubbles have more surface area than larger bubbles. Also the smaller micro bubbles stay in the water column longer creating more contact time thus increasing the amount of DOC's being attached and released at the top of the column. In actuality when we brew tea we are actually creating a DIY protein fractionator. :cool: So if you want foam use smaller bubbles and lots of them.

Here is a great article that explains protein skimming in detail.

http://www.drtimsaquatics.com/resources/library-presentations/aquarium-hobby/proterin-skimming

 

[Minitiger]

I use bountea bio activator for a carb source in my brews, it has yucca in it, and I always get foam. If I ever want to defoam something (like when using sea green) I toss in a tiny bit of fish hydrolysate.

outwest

This is EXACTLY why I just read this (kind of old) thread. I make two different teas, one with Neptune's Harvest fish/kelp hydolysate and one without (the only other ingredients are EWC and molasses). The ones that I add the hydrolysate to NEVER foam, the ones without always do. Not that I thought I was doing anything "wrong" or the teas were "bad," I already knew that foam doesn't mean shit, but I was definitely curious if other people had the same experience as me. Good to know y'all are out there haha....

 

[Coronel]

Just my two cents.

Foam happens because of surface tension, the more the solids suspended in a solution, the higher the surface tension, thus the easier to coat the bubble with a thin film of the liquid phase.

for those looking to reduce the foaming over flow, you can increase the pressure of a closed but vented reservoir by using a ghetto style release valve, inspire yourself on the ones on a pressure cooker (a heavy piece of metal sleeve covering a hole on the top, when the injected air pressure overcomes the weight of the sleeve the excess air is reduced, this also increases the ammount of dissolved gasses by increasing the pressure of the hydrostatic column thus bubbles are trapped in the liquid, but do not shake or they get released)

Yucca is mostly carbohydrates with very little oil, so i suppose it would add food to the microbes but will do nothing in terms of adding and oil layer to the surface.

btw coating the surface with oil would reduce the gases exchange on the surface potentially trapping co2 and other byproducts of microbial feeding.

 

[risasdemaria]

Foam indicates nothing but bubbles. ;)

that is not true

ever heard of "obligate aerobes" :?

and "biofilm" :? and "Pellicle" :?

 

[risasdemaria]

by creating bubbles, we're creating the habitat for those beneficial obligate (or not) aerobes like some of the bacillus. subtilis, thuringiensis, or lacto (either obligate or not it would not matter in this case as they are aerobes anyways)

at the end of the day the micro life thrives in pellicles (that's why the 50% humidity in compost), just like when we look thru the microscope, isn't a pellicle what we are looking at? and there's even room for protozoa to go "up" and "down", so, a pellicle is already "deep" for a bacteria or a protozoa

so yes, foam is more than just bubbles ;)

thanks!