January 2009
You are currently browsing the articles from Red Worm Composting written in the month of January 2009.
This question comes from Mike (if you are out there, Mike – your email address didn’t work for me):
Your site is very informative. I started 2 indoor worm bins about 2
months ago. Hope they’ll make it; your You Tube design.
What caught my interest was the Black Soldier Fly larvae and The
BioPod.
They do show up in worm bins but is it possible to cultivate them for
fish food and feed in Northern Ontario?
Hi Mike – nice to see a msg from a fellow Ontarian (Ontarioan?! I don’t know! haha)!
Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on your perspective) soldier flies are primarily found in warmer zones – I don’t even see any down here in the south (Waterloo region). You MIGHT be able to cultivate them indoors but I suspect this would be a little complicated since the adults would presumably need to be provided with ideal mating conditions.
Who knows though – if you had a heated building – perhaps with some potted shrubs – and you buy some of the larvae, maybe you can get them to reach adulthood and breed. I think something like mealworms (or of course, Red Worms) would probably be a lot easier, but it all depends on how badly you want them! 
Unfortunately, this is not my area of expertise, but perhaps one of our resident BSFL experts will see this and chime in with their thoughts!
Written by Bentley on January 18th, 2009 with 48 comments.
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This post is so long overdue it’s almost silly. But hey – I’m a pretty silly guy!
I figured that – if nothing else – this final vermicomposting trench wrap-up could at least help to inspire a few readers to add trench gardens to their plans for this year’s gardening season!
Based on the number of times I’ve referred to my previous trench posts, and all the positive things I’ve had to say about this approach, I’m sure you won’t be surprised to learn that I considered my vermicomposting trench projects an overwhelming success. In a sense I’m kicking myself a little for never having thought of doing this before. Obviously, the restaurant vermicomposting project was a major influence.
In fact, I’m not even sure ‘projects’ is the right term, given the fact that initially I was just looking for a way to deal with hundreds of pounds of food waste without offending my neighbors! But of course, they blossomed (literally – haha) from there and really gave me a taste (literally) of what’s possible.
Let’s review some of the advantages of this approach:
- Great way to deal with large quantities of organic waste, easily and hassle-free
- Provides plants with an all-natural and continuous supply of nutrients throughout the growing season (assuming enough materials are added initially, or materials are added on an ongoing basis)
- Provides plants with readily available water source during the hot months of summer
- Eliminates the need to ‘harvest’ compost, separate it from worms etc etc
- It’s a great way to produce a large, thriving population of composting worms in your garden (but remember – they will tend to stay in the trenches, not move into your soil)
- No need for supplementation with inorganic fertilizers
- Helps to boost your local ecosystem (my trenches helped to produce LOTS of crickets as well, which would have been a great food source for backyard chickens if I had them, and of course any natural predators in the area)
- Very ‘eco-friendly’ in general
- Trenches are an effective booby trap for nosy neighbours
Now thatsa what I call a Baby tomato!
As I’ve stated before, my gardening skills in general are not top-notch – I tend to be lazy and just don’t dedicate the time either to planning or to the learning of proper techniques. As such, I was pretty impressed with how well everything grew – and it makes me wonder what real gardeners would be able to accomplish with this approach!
Final tomato ‘clean-up harvest’
I grew so many tomatoes and zucchinis that I was literally giving away shopping bags full to any friends and family that would take them – and still, not all were used (yeah – worm food!!!).
Although started very late, the pumpkin patch / potato garden did quite well
I’ve written more about my ‘sandbox self-fertilizing garden‘ over on the Compost Guy blog, but this was another example of a successful implementation of the composting trench approach. I didn’t even plant anything in this bed until mid-July, but still managed to produce a nice big pumpkin for Halloween (also some smaller ones, but they just ended up as worm food). The potato crop was fairly disappointing, but hopefully we’ll see an improvement in yield this year with a bit more of a proactive approach.
This poor, unsuspecting pumpkin will soon be a ghoulish jack-o-lantern!
I’m sure some people were left wondering if the trenches were going to be kept active and added to during the winter months. While I seriously considering making an effort to do so, I realized that it was probably better to put most of my focus on the big winter worm bed we set up over at my dad’s place.
As such, I actually moved a lot of material (containing a LOT of worms) from the fence-line trench over to the sandbox garden. Unfortunately, winter hit a little early this year and I wasn’t able to protect the sandbox bed as planned.
As you may recall from my last winter composting update, a very brief bit of really nice weather (which resulted in most of the snow disappearing) over the holidays did allow me to better prepare the sandbox for the very cold weather typical of Jan and Feb. At the same time, I added a bunch of manure to the fence-line trench to provide a nice food boost for the worms once spring arrives.
Since I am no longer involved in the restaurant vermicomposting project, my waste material of choice this year will likely be horse manure – it should be interesting to see how it compares to the food waste. I predict that it will be excellent for plant growth (since it already contains a lot of plant nutrients), but that it won’t have all the same advantages – such as providing water for the plants the way the food waste did.
Anyway – I definitely can’t wait to get things rolling! Apart from revamping my current trench systems, I have plans to make at least one or two more. One in particular should be really interesting. I live on a very open, exposed property – something that has really bothered me (and likely my neighbors – haha) ever since moving here. This year I’ve decided to create a natural (and seasonal) privacy fence along the back fence-line, using Jerusalem Artichoke. My neighbor sets up an above-ground pool every year in her backyard, so I don’t think she’ll mind having the extra privacy as well (although she is the furthest thing from being an ‘earthy’ gardening type, so she may think it’s an eyesore). Aside from hopefully providing a fast growing wall of foliage, the ‘artichokes’ will offer some food value as well since the tuberous roots are edible.
I would love to hear about other people’s outdoor vermicomposting projects this year, so please write in to tell me about them. I’ll likely feature some of these on the blog (for those who provide photos and are interested in this) as well.
Previous Vermicomposting Trench Posts
The Vermicomposting Trench
The Vermicomposting Trench – Part II
Zucchini Recipes, Anyone?
Technorati Tags: trench, gardening, garden, compost, composting, vermicompost, vermicomposting, worm composting, earthworms, earth worms, food waste, manure, tomatoes, zucchini, potatoes, pumpkins, garbage, organic gardening, sustainable
Written by Bentley on January 16th, 2009 with 5 comments.
Read more articles on Gardening and Large-Scale Vermicomposting.
…you’re the only person you know who gets excited about rotting produce.
…any time you try to type the words “world”, “warm”, “word” or “work” you end up with “worm”.
…you have a worm bin that doubles as a piece of furniture.
…you’ve attempted to name all your worms at least once.
…your heart skips a beat walking down the plastic bin aisle in department stores.
…you start seeing EVERY container as a potential worm bin.
…you are shocked when your friends tell you they spent $200 on new “bedding”.
…your worms get more respect that your cats/dogs.
…on warm, rainy days you walk along the sidewalk on tippy toes, looking down constantly.
…the phrase “they’re only worms!” deeply offends you.
…you love the smell of a worm bin in the morning.
…you welcome guests into your home by saying “hey, wanna go see my worms?”.
…you’d be a millionaire if you received a dime for every fruit fly and fungus gnat hatched in your home.
…you include ‘vermicomposting’ as part of your skill-set on resumes.
…you start eyeing produce (with an evil glint in your eye) in your fridge well before it’s past its prime.
…the picture above makes you smile.
C’mon everyone – join in the fun! Help me build the list!
Written by Bentley on January 14th, 2009 with 33 comments.
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Ok – I guess it is reader question today here on the blog (haha). Here is a good one from Anne:
I’m curious:
When companies advertise selling one, two, five, etc pounds of worms, what actually weighs one, etc pounds? How much is worm weight and how much is bedding?
Approx how many worms per pound? …..funny question…..
Thanks so much!
Anne
Hi Anne,
Every dealer is different, but I can tell you what SHOULD weigh 1 lb, 2 lb etc – it should be the worms themselves. ie actual worm biomass. It should NOT be worms and bedding, unless clearly stated on the website (I have yet to find a site that includes this info).
The bedding used for shipping – very often moistened peat moss – can weigh a fair amount on its own, so when included in the weight for pricing purposes the customer will obviously receive a lot fewer worms. In my opinion there should be at least a 1:1 ratio of bedding weight to worm weight for optimal shipping, but the bedding weight definitely should not be included in the price. In other words, if you order 1 lb of worms, the package you receive should be more than 2 lbs (obviously there is the box and packing material to consider here as well).
That being said, depending on the length of the trip and the time of year etc, there may be a reduction in weight during shipping due to water loss (worms are mostly water after all), but this typically won’t be too significant if the worms are packed well and the trip is relatively short.
The practice of including bedding weights in pricing (or just dishonest weights in general) helps to explain why worm pricing can be all over the map. My advice is to be wary of dealers with very low pricing unless you’ve dealt with them before or know someone else who has. Really when it comes down to it, the best approach is to use caution when dealing with suppliers you are unfamiliar with. I’m not saying this to slam my “competitors” by any means – all I am suggesting is that you try to get to know the dealer a little (or find reviews online) before buying from them.
If they have a website, perhaps send them an e-mail and ask them a few questions. Their response time and helpfulness can be pretty good indicators right off the bat. If they don’t bother replying or they seem abrasive in any way, it probably just isn’t worth it. Some dealers aren’t all that comfortable online, and that’s ok – in that case try giving them a call if they have a number posted somewhere.
As far as how many worms there are in 1 lb, a fairly good estimate is 1000 (of various sizes) for Red Worms. I’ve had large Red Worms that seemed to be in the 800/lb range, but I’ve also had populations of smaller worms that would have been closer to 2000/lb. Maturity and the overall health of the worms can obviously play a pretty important role. For European Nightcrawlers, the counts are generally somewhere between 300 and 400 per pound (gives you an idea of how much bigger these worms are).
Hope this helps!
Written by Bentley on January 13th, 2009 with 2 comments.
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I haven’t done a Q&A post here in awhile, so I figured I’d tackle an interesting one that recently hit my inbox. This one comes from Jim:
Hi, I want to take some red worms into my 3rd grade class
and talk about vericulture composting. I picked up a worm and it
secrected a yelllow liquid in my hand from the band near its head.
What can I tell the kids it is?
Hi Jim,
This liquid is known as coelomic fluid, which comes (not too suprisingly) from the ‘coelom’.
So what exactly is the coelom??
It is a large fluid-filled cavity that extends the entire length of the worm, located between the body wall and the alimentary canal (the digestive system). Worms release coelomic fluid for a number of reasons, one of those being stress. As such, Red Worms will sometimes release this liquid as a defense mechanism when they are feeling threatened.
Not that you likely would have wanted to test this out, but according to Edwards and Bohlen (1996), Eisenia fetida (the Red Worm) gets its name from the fact that its coelomic fluid smells like garlic (‘fetid’ basically means foul smelling).
Another interesting tidbit gleaned from Edwards and Bohlen (1996) – there is apparently a species of earthworm known as the “squirter earthworm” (Didymogaster sylvaticus) that can shoot coelomic fluid as far as 30 cm!!
Needless to say, you probably wouldn’t want to pick that one up!
Anyway, Jim – perhaps this was more of an answer than you bargained for (haha), but hopefully it helped!
REFERENCES
Edwards, C.A. and P.J. Bohlen. 1996. The biology and ecology of earthworms (3rd Edition). Chapman & Hall, London, 426pp.
Written by Bentley on January 13th, 2009 with 2 comments.
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