Collecting IMO in southern california

Forgive me if this is a stupid question but I am just starting out with korean natural farming. I have watched quite a few videos on how to make the different solutions and I think I am about ready to start trying them out but my biggest concern is collecting IMO here in southern california. We generally have 90-110F days right now and almost never have rain. Where I am I don’t have a forrest to go into to find the microorganisms like in the videos. I have looked around my area in some of the lesser maintained areas and have not been able to find any mycelium growing under the leaves anywhere. My question is do you guys have an recommendations on where to go in a desert like climate to collect IMO? Also from my understanding you can essentially use the strongest fastest growing weeds I can find to take and make FPJ then just mix it with brown sugar and let it ferment to extract the “blood” then use that on my plants to help give them those desirable characteristics. Is this Correct? One last question do you have any good places to get brown rice vinegar? I can find regular unseasoned rice vinegar everywhere but I have still not found Brown Rice Vinegar anywhere. Is it the same thing? I apologize for the long post but I am very interested in this and want to do it right. Thank you in advance for any help!

Sean

Pure KNF 9 Core Solutions

seancav7 asked 6 years ago

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Answers (2)

I just had the pleasure to go to one of Drake’s workshops and asked him a very similar question. When collecting in a desert it helps to apply the maintenance solution on and around the collection area 3 days before you begin the IMO collection. Water the collection area in the evenings or mornings during this 3 day period.

Maintenance Solution (1 Gallon of water):

OHN (medicine) : 4ml

BRV (Stimulator) : 8ml

FPJ (Food) : 8ml

Fall is a good time to collect in the desert, but it won’t hurt to get a summer collection to :). Also planning your collection around retrieving your collection during the full moon is beneficial. The moon’s gravitational pull pulls the ground water higher, helping the topsoil to have more moisture.

Healthy broad leaf trees with the leaves accumulated beneath are a good place to collect from.

Push the leaves aside until you get to the native soil.
Line the native soil with the leaf litter or the broken down leaves. Or anything thing that has mycelium growth.
Place Collection box on top and leaf litter and cover with surrounding leaf litter and leaves.

You are correct on the FPJ. One thing to keep in mind is to keep plants separated into their own batch. If you want to apply two or more FPJs to a crop you would want to mix after the ferment.

I’ve had the same issue finding BRV up in Oregon as well. You can make Makgeolli and let in turn to vinegar with or without a mother, or fruit vinegar will work as well. I have been using apply cider vinegar. You can also make vinegar from FPJ waste product. Chris Trump has a How to video.

How to: Vinegar with Chris Trump