March Worm Moon (Vermicomposting revisited)
Years ago while visiting my children's middle school, I was shown a vermicomposting project that the science teacher had set up for her students. Vermicomposting is the process of using worms (Eisenia foetida) to eat food scraps and produce rich compost.
After ordering a pound of worms from Plains Georgia, I received a package label "live worms". Preparation was simple, I prepared a bedding of shredded newspaper, some soil, coffee grounds and some crushed eggshells, and dumped in the box of worms. The worms have been thriving every since. The are easily the most trouble free creatures I have encountered, they are much less problematic than the cats (who produce unusable compost). All they need is an occasional melon rind or some corn cobs and they happily munch away. You can actually hear them eat!
The only issue I face is the separation of the worms from the compost. Placing newer material on one side of the bin is supposed to produce a "worm migration" from the old to the new, but not for these worms (I can only assume that these are sedentary worms that have grown fat and lazy on melon rinds).
After ordering a pound of worms from Plains Georgia, I received a package label "live worms". Preparation was simple, I prepared a bedding of shredded newspaper, some soil, coffee grounds and some crushed eggshells, and dumped in the box of worms. The worms have been thriving every since. The are easily the most trouble free creatures I have encountered, they are much less problematic than the cats (who produce unusable compost). All they need is an occasional melon rind or some corn cobs and they happily munch away. You can actually hear them eat!
The only issue I face is the separation of the worms from the compost. Placing newer material on one side of the bin is supposed to produce a "worm migration" from the old to the new, but not for these worms (I can only assume that these are sedentary worms that have grown fat and lazy on melon rinds).
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| Setting up a bed of torn newspaper, coffee grounds and crushed eggshells |
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| Red Wrigglers |
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Not sure if the mite in center of photo is a friend or foeUpdate Dec 28, 2017
This post was published on March 2, 2007. At that time I was using a single bin for my worm ranch. Eventually I purchased a product called the Worm Factory which made worm separation so much easier.I'm guessing that I have been ranching worms for over 15 years maybe more
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| Worm Factory consists of stacking bins with open grills. The worms migrate upward and the bottom bins contain the finished compost. New waste is added to the top bin. It is a clever design |
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| This is the earlier version of the Worm Factory, the cover has been redesigned to act as a tray to facilitate emptying the bins |
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