Comments on: Vermicompost Vitality

By: Bentley

Bentley — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 01:56:16 +0000

Hi Allochthon,
I live in a farming region where Red Worms are relatively widespread (in comparison to northern regions). I am still a little skeptical about the notion of this species causing issues in forests to be totally honest – I have yet to find a population of Red Worms in forest litter. I find them around my property in funny locations, but they only seem to actually thrive in areas with lots of rich organic matter (such as manure, food waste etc).
I’ve read that Canadian Nightcrawlers can cause serious damage in forests, and this makes a lot more sense since they live in soil and feed on materials like leaf litter (they end up greatly speeding up decomposition of litter and overall cycling of nutrients).

Anyway, I am far from an expert on this particular issue, but I do know that the concern with non-native worms relates to northern forests (Minnesota is actually quite a bit north of me even though I am in Canada).

There are likely some Red Worms living in various locations on our suburban block thanks to my vermi-activities, but I am not worried that they’ve invaded and are taking over our local forests.

You HAVE piqued my curiosity though – there is a forest down the street from me. I’d be interested to see if I could find any Red Worms there.

By: allochthon

allochthon — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 21:22:06 +0000

On a local gardening list, there was an extensive discussion about freezing vermicompost to kill off the worms and cocoons. The worry was that fresh compost would allow the worms out into the local environment, where the non-native worms can do a fair amount of damage (http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/invasives/terrestrialanimals/earthworms/index.html).

That site states that red wrigglers can’t (yet) survive a Minnesota winter, but with a litle assistance they certainly can, as you’ve proven (such a cool project!)

Have you given much thought to this, with your worm trenches and winter composting?

By: Heather

Heather — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 00:46:29 +0000

My thoughts are that bottled vermi-tea might have same fertilizer impact (as fresh), but not the wonderful, impact of the beneficial organisms. No oxygen, no life.

By: Bentley

Bentley — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 16:05:14 +0000

Glad you chimed in, Bob – that’s exactly it. When vermicompost/castings ARE stored properly, the shelf life is going to be much longer. I would still argue that the best castings are the ones that have been recently harvested – but it could be many months or years (assuming good storage) before the beneficial properties are reduced substantially.

And of course, Jim is definitely right about the worm tea – that is a whole other matter altogether. I still have no clue how Terracycle does it – but I suspect their product simply isn’t as good as a fresh high quality brew of worm tea.

By: Bob Packard

Bob Packard — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 15:56:18 +0000

Hi Bentley, I’d like to here what your friends at Worm Power have to say about this. I bought 60 each 30 pound bags of castings about a year ago and have been using them all along to fertize plants, trees and vegetables and everything appears to be thriving nicely here. I also use them for teas. I bought the large amount to save on freight.

Also we have been in a drought here for over a year and I fear that the chances of burning plants with chemicals is even more reason to stick with castings and worm compost.

By: Uncle Jim's Red Wiggler Farm

Uncle Jim's Red Wiggler Farm — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 15:07:09 +0000

Another thought. Worm Tea (liquid collected from fresh worm castings) is only good maybe a day or so after collecting it. If you buy it bottled or store it, it really loses it power quickly.