Does molasses and water go bad after a while? Say I mixed a gallon of water with 1tbsp of molasses, how long can that gallon sit there before it goes bad? Or does it not go bad? From experience, it smells like death after a while
I'm not sure if you're asking about hours or days or weeks, but anything that "smells like death" should not be used on your plants...
To be fair, molasses always smells like death. In my experience, as long as molasses is kept in a cool, dark place, it won't go bad.
Well honestly man alot of organic nutes and nute mixtures smell like death. I was asking about how many days. It doesn't take a gallon of water for each watering so it takes a while to use up
I not completely positive, but I don't think you want it to wait around too long, I had mixed somw up and let ti sit a few weeks and it grew a film on it, now, I'm not sure if that is good or bad, I never smelled it, I just dumped it out. I usually mix it the day or night before, let it sit a bit but not too much.
It is my understanding that anything that has some sugars in it - which Molasses certainly does - will promote fungal and/or bacterial growth eventually if exposed to light. So Molasses and water by itself won't necessarily go bad, but if there are any contaminates in it - like even a little speck of dirt - it will grow something eventually. When I put Molasses in my water, I am careful not to put a spoon that has been in the water back in the Molasses. Only clean spoons/measuring cups go in the molasses and I let it drip down into the water, then stir with another spoon. Because I don't want any bacteria that may be floating around in my water (from nutes, or just not getting the watering can completely sterile) from getting back into the Molasses - where it might propagate rapidly and contaminate future water/Molasses mixes. And I don't let the water with Molasses sit around for long. Like an hour or two tops. ---- An interesting related side note - the reason that Diabetics are more prone to infection that non-diabetics is because their blood has more sugars in it. So fungus and bacteria can propagate more rapidly than in someone with lower blood sugar. Think of your water like that. If it would grow something bad if you left it sit for weeks - which if the chlorine is gone out of it, it will - then more sugar in it means it will grow something quicker.
i would use the molasses immediately after mixing, if you leave it out it could mold and grow bacteria.