I finally convinced one of my distributors for my homemade bagged compost, and one of my favorite local farm feed supply store manager, to start supplying economical gallon jugs of farm grade liquid molasses for all my sustainable gardening students and local organic buddies.

The problem is that last week, several jugs exploded on the shelves in the store! He was upset and didn't have a clue what caused the explosion. So now he is only going to get it on a "as-needed" basis, and store it in coolers in the stores.

My question is what happened? Do you think a microbial reaction took place in the jugs? Do you think it was the plastic gallon milk jugs that he was using to store the liquid molasses? Was it the room temperature of the store? Was there some strange microbe living in the store around all those grain meal feeds or chemical pesticides?

When I bottled molasses and compost tea, we used lids that breathed to prevent just that situation. Also, some people put Sodium Benzoate (sp) in the mix to put the microbes to sleep. They wake up when applied.
Tony M

You are exactly right. Microbial activity starts to work and this causes the pressure to build up in the container and explode. They must leave the lids loose on the container.
Richard Spitzer

Interesting, I've never (knocking on wood) had a jug of liquid molasses explode. Not vented or loose lids here Does anyone else have this problem? That would create an awful mess

I believe that the type of molasses one buys makes the difference on whether it might explode the bottle. The stuff in grocery stores and most nurseries/feed stores won't explode to my knowledge. The bulk, commercial stuff is usually the one to watch.

I have a feed store that will only order special because he had the same problem with storing it. However, I have not heard of any problems with the horticulture molasses.
Richard Spitzer