Good to know Wet, thanks buddy - I thought the night crawlers lived solo in deeper holes in the soil and come to the surface at night to forage and reproduce. I've never added in any worms in any of my compost piles or bins and they are populated with the red wigglers and I see an occasional young night crawler but not often. I do see night crawlers (red wigglers are there too) in our gardens but the robins make short order of them.
I'd check this place out. They have cocoons which can be a good deal. blueridgevermiculture.com I've never bought worms though. I got free craigslist manure and the worms came with it. Solo
Ive read that the Red Wrigglers are basically the stone cold nuts when it comes to VC. But, I think in my situation they are too good in that I'll probably have to feed them a lot more than my own personal scraps/garbage. You're right! After more reading I'm sticking with Euro Nightcrawlers! Even tho africans are better for the heat, they seem to do the worst (of the 3) in cold temperatures. Thats the silly thing about living in the desert.....its hot as hell in the summer, but winter nights can get really cold too! So Im just gonna stick with the middle ground Euros. Will be ordering later this week when my replacement debit card comes in! Fired up!
Red wigglers will go thru our 165 gal worm bin in about 2 months - I never repopulated the bin this spring just threw a handful of EWC in there from last season.
Bob The Canadian (?) nightcrawlers are totally different and won't work in bins at all. Seems I've read somewhere that now they think the euros might just be a larger version of the RW instead of a different species. IDK, and care less as long as they keep pooping black gold. Wet
Hey guys I found this little gold mine on my property. Any tips on how to dry and screen a 2 gal sample? I left all the earthworms in the tree trunk
Haven't had the best luck googling or searching the thread to get an answer. How much, in weight, would you need to feed the worms weekly? Im ready to make the jump, but not sure Ill have enough (good) food scraps to keep them fed well. Looking into horse manure cuz I'm reading that worms like that. Still googling and searching this thread about that stuff tho
I keep a little compost scraps pail under my kitchen sink thay we just throw stuff in on a daily basis. You start out giving a cup or so to the bin in the corners and see how fast it disappears. That'll give you a good starting point. My worms will power through several cups of scraps in a very short time.
You are way overthinking the whole food thing. Especially the not having enough part. Worms consume the bedding also. If it decomposes, it's food. Even if you had zero scraps, a 50# bag of 'worm food' is like $12 or so and easily over a years supply. There are others equally cheap like chicken 'laying mash', for one example. I'd be a bit hesitant with the horse manure, especially if they were grazing on herbicide treated fields. Really need to research this before you use it. Get the bin started! Food is your least concern, really! Wet
I started this bad boy less than 2 months ago. Got a good 5 gallons of the black gold. I plug the hole and slant the bath. Will drain the worm juice soon. Its working so well ive grabbed another bath out of a skip. This time I will plumb the bath to a water but to make harvesting the worm juice even easier. hopefully I can produce at least 5 gallon a month of pure vermicompost. Get a few slugs with this method but they too poop some good stuff.
not sure this is the right thread but i have a question about composting. so basically i have this bokashi bucket thats been filling up slowly and i want to compost the bokashi further so i can use it as bedding for my worms. now my question is the bokashi green or brown material, and what is a good cheap material i can mix it with to start a compost going? and last, how much does it need to break down before i can give it to my worms? peace!
Which type of worms do you want in your pots? I'm thinking red wrigglers and some kind of night crawler or worm that like to stay in the soil.
red worms or "Eisenia foetida" are what you want. . . . . guys my wormbin is crawling (no pun intended) with pill bugs and tiny mites. now i know these are good guys but is it normal to have them in such huge quantities? the whole surface area of the bedding is just exploding with them
Scoob ... Looks like the *too's* Too much food, or too much wet food. You seem to be adding food faster than the worms can consume it, or faster than it can break down to be consumed. Stop feeding for a week or 2, let the bin dry out some and I'll bet you see an improvement. Wet
Looks like there isnt too much bedding in there. Whack in a load of shredded paper, this will help dry it out too.