Any other Vermicomposters here? We just started!

[dice]

Lawn clippings decay pretty fast, and worms consume them rather
quickly. Leaves decay more slowly, but they like them for bedding.

Commercial worm farmers around here use mostly manure for
worm food, as far as I know (cheap and plentiful, often only costs
the gas to haul it).

[rws-NH-45]

I had a worm farm in a 20 gallon Tupperware bin. Problem was I started them out with some compost made from horse manure and shavings. The worms were so happy with the horse manure that they didn't touch the food waste I put in.

Also, starting in the summertime, we had lots of food scraps, and I really should have taken all fresh vegetable scraps out to the compost piles, and only used food left over after cooking.

I'm about to try again -- but for me the Big Thing was giving the worms too much to eat before the population builds up. I gave mine too much food, and ended up with fruit flies.

I've read that one way to get them to migrate up to a new bin is to put a little horse manure in the bottom of the new bin. That or something they really like like melons.

good luck all,
Dick

[Tom Atillo]

Red wigglers love eggshells! They lay their eggs in them (I think the left over whites help them feed the baby worms). A hand full of wigglers will become a mob in no time if you feed them right! Keep em cool and damp and cut grass is a good insulater if it get too cold.

[FreyaFL]

Originally Posted by Tom Atillo

Red wigglers love eggshells! They lay their eggs in them (I think the left over whites help them feed the baby worms). A hand full of wigglers will become a mob in no time if you feed them right! Keep em cool and damp and cut grass is a good insulater if it get too cold.

What do you do with the eggshells? Crush? Pulverize?

[Vespertino]

I'm thinking about making a multi-tier plastic bin worm farm, but I have some questions about keeping them cool during the summer.

The size of my worm farm is probably going to be small since I'm not producing a lot of kitchen scraps (we're a family of two), and I heard that smaller worm bin - especially plastic bin ones- have a very hard time staying cool in the Texas summer, even in the shade.

My hubs is being a jerk about letting me keep the worm farm in the laundry room, so my choices for storage are: outside under a live oak, or in the garage. Neither are particularly good options, temperature-wise, for the wormies during the 100+ degree summer.

Also removed from the list of possibilities is a partially buried bin in the yard, due to it being unsightly it's yet another reason for my hubs to be a jerk about it.

So, no possibility of keeping the worms indoors during the summer, and no possibility of a partially buried system during the summer.

Any tips on keeping the worms cool since I'm forced out of those two solutions?

[Alpinejs]

Vespertino....believe me, I am no expert as I lost all my worms last summer
durng the extended heat while I was gone 5 months to Canada. However,
based on the worm gurus since I got back, if I am to have the same lifestyle, I
should raise the worms in a pit in the shade and arrange for some one to water
the area about every 1 1/2 weeks (well). The other hint was to layer in a lot
of cardboard. Since you don't seem to generate enough kitchen scraps, I am
sure you can find enough cardboard Worms think cardboard is gourmet dining.
Letting that cardboard get soaked also is crucial as the worms think it is gravy.

Good luck and happy fishing. BTW, worm casting isn't a referral to cast for bass
with a hook baited with red wiggler worms.

[Vespertino]

Thanks! Since I just moved I have lots of cardboard boxes Now I have a new use for them.

[Gerris2]

I still have the Rubbermaid Bin I made a couple years ago. The worms are happy as can be. I learned how to make this bin from another Tomatovillian, advice for which I am eternally grateful.

[ArcherB]

I put a truckload of rabbit manure in my compost bin. Within a few weeks, it was FULL of worms and stayed that way for the rest of the year.

Their favorite snack was the pumpkins I threw in there after Halloween.

[Delerium]

Love Vermicomposting!

[z_willus_d]

Delerium, I have/had that same setup/kit. After a bout with black soldier flies, my wife wouldn't let me keep them indoors and they fizzled out in summer heat of my garage a year and a half back. Since then I've only had an outdoor compost pile that hasn't produced the same type of stuff as the warm farm did. I had the same red cup at the bottom catching the leachate -- terrible times when I forgot to dispose of it and it overflowed.

Nice harvest.
-naysen

[Delerium]

Originally Posted by z_willus_d

Delerium, I have/had that same setup/kit. After a bout with black soldier flies, my wife wouldn't let me keep them indoors and they fizzled out in summer heat of my garage a year and a half back. Since then I've only had an outdoor compost pile that hasn't produced the same type of stuff as the warm farm did. I had the same red cup at the bottom catching the leachate -- terrible times when I forgot to dispose of it and it overflowed.

Nice harvest.
-naysen

Hey Naysen! Sorry missed your post (i don't get email updates). Man do we love this WF 360. Wifey has approved a 2nd bin when we go to the National Heirloom expo in Sept. That's where we picked this one up and we got a deal with the extra trays and stuff. We haven't had any issues with the wormbin - i only feed them when the bin looks like it needs a feeding and i add dates to the trays so i know when i actually fed the worms. When the Leachate cup is about 3/4th full i will dump that in to our compost tea that we make outdoors. Our worm bin has so many worms now (started with 1/2 a lb) in it that i take a cup of worms and toss them in our compost bin outside. When ever our plants look like they need a feeding that's when we harvest the castings. Plants love it.

[z_willus_d]

H D-

That's great. I had two bins and the compost outside too. I wish I was allowed to keep the bins indoors. In the garage, it's just too easy for them to become infested with XYZ. I found that if you freeze the produce or whatever you're feeding them before feeding them it (a) helps keep the bin cool when it's warmer and (b) helps the worms break-down and eat the foodstuff faster. I don't think I need to be giving you any advice, though; you've got it working for you just fine.
Enjoy.
-naysen

[Delerium]

Originally Posted by z_willus_d

H D-

I wish I was allowed to keep the bins indoors. In the garage, it's just too easy for them to become infested with XYZ. I found that if you freeze the produce or whatever you're feeding them before feeding them it (a) helps keep the bin cool when it's warmer and (b) helps the worms break-down and eat the foodstuff faster.
-naysen

The worm factory rep told me exactly the same thing you just told me about freezing the food. Which is what we do if we have to much food to add to the worm bin. I learned my lesson 2 years ago overfeeding a homemade worm bin that was in the garage and it got all funky/worms died from the heat (i dumped the whole bin of nasty stuff it in to the macro bin - now the macro bin is full of worms - i thought all the worms were dead). I haven't seen so many worms in my macro bins soil where i grow my maters - now i treat the container like worm bin and add kitchen waste right in to the soil to feed the worms (like Bokashi composting).

After learning my lesson the first time around, Now i don't over feed - date everything i add. And i spread the food throughout all the trays so one tray doesn't have to much food or go anaerobic on me. I only add juicing leftovers since the worms break it down faster and less of a mess than adding kitchen scraps. The kitchen scraps usually get dumped in the compost bin.

[clkeiper]

What do you do with all the worms? at some point there must be way more worms than you need for the bin, right? How do you separate the worms from the castings? they keep laying eggs and leave those in the castings do you not worry about putting them in the garden or the soil for your potted plants? Just wondering as I heard sometime ago that the red worms are not healthy for the forest eco system and I am wondering if I should disregard that information and just go ahead and dump all the extra worms in the garden? or what? I am not going fishing. NOT EVER. If anybody wants my extra worms, please come and get them, you are more than welcome to them.