#worm compost

[corvidconventicle]

I started a worm compost bin and now I’m practically harassing these worms every few hours

[rainbowofcrazy]

Two of my fav reads of 2024:

Grow Your Soil! by Diane Miessler

Worms Eat My Garbage, by Mary Appelhof & Joanne Olszewski

Both are great resources, with lots of easy to digest info for gardeners at any level

[mleepsleep]

[journiland]

Vampire was looking at stuff in sporting goods, which left me standing right next to a refrigerator of fishing bait.

Another thirty redworms begged to come home with me.

They didn't look very lively, but I guess that's expected after being in a fridge. They'd all disappeared under the bedding this morning, so I guess they were alive.

Now I have a whole sixty. Possibly more, by now, if they're getting busy in there.

[urban-homesteading]

How to make money from a Mini Farm: a series

Due to the popularity of my post on how to make money from your mini farm, I’ve decided to go point by point and expand on each one.

Raising Red Wrigglers

1) Give ’em a home

Tumblr user NRDC has an excellent guide on how to make a worm composting bin.

2) Acquire ’em

It’s often hard to tell worm types apart, so it’s best to purchase worms for your compost rather than trying to find them in nature. If you don’t have a local supplier, you can order worms online. It takes about a pound of worms, which is around 1,000 individual worms, to process a half pound of food a day.  I have heard quite a few good reviews about Jim’s Worm Farms, but have not tried them myself.  Otherwise, it is simple to buy them from your local pet store or bait shop.

3) Feed ’em

Here’s a quick chart by NRDC on what you can feed your worms.

You feed your worms with your kitchen scraps. However, that doesn’t mean you can give your worms everything that comes out of your food. You should stick to organic leftovers such as fruits or veggie scraps, grass clippings, bread, beans, and more. Worms don’t have teeth, so chop these materials into chunks that are easier to process.  You can also blend or place the foods in a food processor.

Put in the Worm Bin:

Fruit Scraps

Vegetable Scraps

Paper

Squash and Pumpkins

Eggshells

Coffee

Tea Leaves

Bread

Pasta Grains

Animal Manure (not dog or cat!)

Lawn Clippings (make sure it hasn’t been sprayed with pesticides)

Don’t Put in the Worm Bin:

Salty Foods

Spicy foods

Oils

Foods with Preservatives

Meat

Dairy

4) Breed’em

It is easy to cultivate a massive worm population in a very short time period. An adult red wiggler worm can produce 2 to 3 cocoons every week, and each cocoon can hatch up to 20 baby worms.

When there are too many worms in a particular space, red wigglers tend to slow down their breeding so that their home does not become overcrowded. This helps them to avoid depleting the available food supply.  But, if there are too few worms in an area, the mature breeders will have difficulty locating each other, and reproduction will be hampered.

The best population is a half pound of worms for every square foot of surface area in your worm bin. A bin that is two feet long by one foot wide would have a surface area of 2 x 1 = 2 square feet. One pound of worms would be the perfect amount of worms to stock in this bin if you are trying to breed your worms.

Worm cocoons have the ability to survive in conditions that would kill off the rest of their colony. By focusing their efforts on cocoon production when death may be near, the worms ensure that the colony will carry on into the next generation even if none of your living worms are able to make it through the dangerous conditions.

You are able to harness this natural instinct by allowing your bin to become “slightly” dangerous for a short time. That means you can let it dry out a bit more than you normally would, or you could temporarily move the bin to a less insulated location.  Once you notice an increase in baby cocoons, return the bin to normal conditions so the babies have the best chance for survival.

5) Harvest ’em

The vital job of composting your organic waste and turning it into soil is really all your worms need to do to earn their keep.  But if you would like to make money off of them, there are two ways.  One, you can sell the worm’s compost and casings, or you can sell the worms themselves.

If you just created a worm compost bin, don’t expect castings to be ready for harvest immediately. The worm bin needs to get established, and be routinely fed and fluffed for a few months first. This gives the worms time to eat, turn things over, and break down food and bedding into worm castings – their poop.

A week or two before you want to harvest the worm castings, stir and spread the contents of your bin out in the bottom. Next, feed the worms exclusively on one side of the worm bin during that time. Bury the food (and if needed, any new browns/bedding) in one far corner, with plans to harvest worm castings from the opposite side. The worms should migrate there to eat, leaving the other side of the bin hopefully worm-free. If there is a lot of existing food matter and worms spread evenly throughout your worm bin, it may take a little longer to accomplish this.  (If harvesting large amounts from a bin that is 4-8 months established, you can also dump the whole thing on a tarp.  The sun will warm the pile and the worms will go as deep as possible to escape.  You can then scoop off the top.)

Using a small trowel, scoop out the finished castings from the “resting” side of your worm bin into a bucket.  However, depending on how well broken-down the material in your worm bin is, or how well the worms migrated to the opposite side of the bin, you may need to pick through the material a little by hand. Sift through the castings and throw back large pieces of food matter, lumps of shredded paper or other bedding, and as many worms as you reasonably can. If the worm castings are clumpy, break up the large chunks.  You can also harvest and then sift them with the aid of a simple screen.

6) Sell ‘em

As always, your best chances of selling your worms and worms casings are going to come from your marketing (Craigslist/Facebook Marketplace), farmer’s markets, and small businesses.  Call your bait stores, your small gardening shops and greenhouses, and exotic pet stores.  Even if they don’t want to sell your products directly, they may allow you to hang a flyer on their poster board.

If you would like some more in depth details on creating a worm colony, please check out this excellently written article.  

[tinyshe]

Garden Report 21.06.19

Maintenance is the name of the game these days. With the rains there is a new flush of growth ... and pest. Will be spending quite some time just whacking back the jungle. Need to add fertilizer/worm compost to garden containers.

The Burbank plums are doing nicely; they should be ready in a couple of weeks. The European pear is putting on another flush of blooms all on its south face. It will be interesting to see if I get a double harvest or a fruit drop. The Autumn raspberries are not doing so great as the root stock/crowns they sent were sub-par. There are a couple of blooms but the plants are so late sprouting and small, I don’t expect any ting about them this season. It is interesting to see the different container gardens all in the same area, with the same soil and plants/care but yet some plants refuse to thrive. I’ve noticed this in the grow box as well. Some of the tomatoes are getting ready to flower. It has been months since I planted peas and the few survivors are just starting to bloom. Its been a strange growing year so far!

The chickens have just stopped laying, just like that. Will have to watch to see if they are going to molt. I have gone through three different brands of lay rations and they just hate it -- I suspect they are from the same mill and just repackaged for different outlets. The scratch they like has either radish/rape seed filler that they hate -- they refuse to eat it. Today had to clear out the aviary of billed out kibble and red seed. Tomorrow will bring in new beach sand and turn over the earth for them.

I have a great influx of bumble bees this year! I didn’t get around to removing all the hedge nettle (native prickle mint) and they are just wild over it. Will leave it until it sets seed then its out of there.

Working on removing some brickwork as I need to move Mary’s lemon tree she gave me. It is not getting enough sun now that we have moved the Asian pear where it now is flourishing. Part of me says just stick it back in a pot but the other part wants it to be free to grow in the earth.

Harvesting: red sail lettuce, artichokes, rhubarb alpine strawberries ever-bearing strawberries, blueberries, chard, variety of kales, rapini (italian broc), roses, nettles, nasturtiums, borage, parsley, chives, salade burnette, comfrey, sorrel (french and bloody dock), collards.

[spreadcasts]

Harvesting vermicompost from our 10-gallon worm farm.

[louwithlesswaste]

Here's a basic guide to household compostable products!

DO COMPOST: food waste (excluding meat, processed grains, or dairy), coffee and tea grounds, paper plates, cups, and napkins.

Note: products must be marked compostable, not biodegradable.. they are not the same.

DO NOT COMPOST: meat, most grains, or dairy, plastic, wax coated materials, items contaminated with these materials/foods, bones, or household products.

I'll make you more detailed post in the future :)