Comments on: Return of the VermiBag

By: Bentley

Bentley — Mon, 09 Nov 2020 10:41:17 +0000

This is great, John! Leaf mold would be an excellent living material so I can see how mixing with your food materials would be a really effective strategy. Thanks for sharing!
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By: John

John — Mon, 09 Nov 2020 00:09:57 +0000

I have an old worm inn and a worm inn Mega. They hang together in a closet in my basement. There are no wrong ways to use a worm inn except by not using enough water. But I will tell you how I use mine. I only empty them once a year in the spring when I use the castings in various ways in my garden. I empty from the bottom about 3/4 of the material, and yes there are some worms in mix. I don’t worry about them because they end up in my raised gardens. I only use leaf mold that is not composted completely along with food scraps for feeding. I found that top feeding with bedding cover left an inch or two of dry not composted material all around the edges of my inns, So now I mix leaf mold and food scraps together {like your home made manure} and dig down along one side of the bin, pour the mix in and cover it over, no top covering of anything. I only feed about once every two weeks so I water well at feeding. {about a pint of water in each inn}. Winter time of course uses more water when furnace is running. I love these Worm Inns, they work for me. Thank you for selling them to me! The product that comes out is outstanding! When people see my gardens they all ask me how I can grow such huge tomatoes and peppers. It makes me smile!
John

By: Bentley

Bentley — Tue, 03 Nov 2020 11:17:36 +0000

Hey Shaul – I’ve definitely owned shredders that won’t handle cardboard, and it’s the layer the worms really seem to love about the corrugated stuff. The be on the safe side, one that claims 20 sheet shredding or higher is a good way to go in my humble opinion – and I’ve seen them for a reasonable price (unlike the crazy industrial grade ones lol).
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By: Shaul

Shaul — Tue, 03 Nov 2020 04:41:18 +0000

Bentley; Any shredder will do cardboard. If the cardboard is too thick for the feed slot, then just separate the layers.

By: Bentley

Bentley — Sun, 01 Nov 2020 14:30:44 +0000

Hi Zanne – I always feel very uncomfortable when I see people talk about “throwing out” ANY form of organic matter (and it is still sad to see it happen so often) , so you are making an excellent point here!

No machine shredding for me – other than some stuff I make with my mulching mower (should be writing about that soon). I’ve been tempted to get a really nice paper shredder (that can handle cardboard) but there is also something satsifying about doing it by hand (especially while watching movies or educational videos)!

There are a wide range of living materials “out there” – but they certainly do become more difficult to track down during the winter in many locations. Good news is that it simply takes a bit of time for newbies to make their own in a vermicomposting system. Microbes are everywhere – so it’s really just a matter of time!
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By: Zanne

Zanne — Sat, 31 Oct 2020 15:24:11 +0000

This could also serve as a great tutorial on what to do with expired or otherwise unusable for their original purpose: grains, bird seed, sacks of animal feed, etc. Which is information harder to break into easy information for a new worm herder’s bin that is also fed scraps. So usually the advice is to throw it out.

I like that you didn’t use any machine shredded (I think?) materials in this VermiBag (Mini?). The only thing that might be inaccessible is the worm rich material, but a new person should get something like that with their first worm order. Perhaps less of the other helpful life forms for the first few weeks, as those recover from dry shipping conditions, but eventually it should be a well populated bin!