John’s VB24 Update

Waaay back in December (2011), I posted an email and some pictures sent in by my good friend, John Duffy, relating to his VB24 building experience (see “John’s VermBin24“). As mentioned in that post, John had (kindly) agreed to continue sending in updates/pics – helping to keep all of us posted on his progress.

Unfortunately, while John DID in fact send me some additional updates, yours truly never got around to getting them posted on the blog. (sorry folks!)

The good news is that John has continued to use and enjoy his VB24, and he recently sent me a brand new update – so here you go (thank again, John!):

I think I’m finally getting the hang of the VB24. I started it in December when it was cold in my unheated garage. My solution for generating heat was to use fresh horse manure. This worked pretty well as I was able to keep the bedding temp between 45 – 50 F. As it got warmer in March & April, I experienced a higher number of escapes than I would have liked to see… I added a bright LED light in the bottom catch area and that seemed to help.

Then came the horrendous triple digit temps…Despite being over 100 F in my garage, the bedding temp stayed between 85 & 90 F. I was adding quite a bit of frozen melon, veggies & fruit waste to help keep the temps down. I am amazed at how much water I had to add daily (usually 1 -2 quarts)…It is certainly a lot different than my stackable bin…

My biggest handicap is that my wife & I don’t generate enough worm food to feed my herd so, I have the ladies at my wife’s office saving their fruit & veggie waste. (I’ve even gotten a few of them interested in worming)
My advice to anyone thinking about building a flow-thru bin, DO IT! The VB24 is pretty easy to build. It is very well designed and should last a long time.

Last night, I gave my worms a special treat…I cut up a whole watermelon, ran it through my garage sale blender and made a big batch of worm smoothies. I checked on the worms this morning and they were having a food orgy. They were going crazy with the melon mush! I think I’m going to start blending all my worm food. They seem to go for it a lot faster!

The VC is looking pretty good too!

John tells me he’s adding about 1/2 gallon of his “smoothie” mix (or the equivalent of ~ 2 lb of waste materials) every other day – yet his impression is that it might not even be enough!

Cool stuff, John! Thanks again for sharing.
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