My next door neighbor thinks it’s a little extreme. He busts his hump to rake and bag 50 bags and wonders why I don’t do the same. Yard waste pickup is $3 a bag! That’s why….
Just as I went checking my worms, I've spotted this little fella walking under the top cardboard. Small like a mite, but it's claws are much more visible... Fascinating all the life form that lives on earth! these would be peudoscorpion, and would be considered beneficial.
I've never seen one before you posted it. Very cool. I didn't even notice you told us what it was in your post. Stoner moment on my part.
I haven’t seen one either. Almost looks like a mini crayfish. I did get stung by a scorpion pulling tarp in NorCal that one season.
I've never been stung by one. But, I saw my brother get stung. His thumb got pretty swollen. He said it felt like a really bad bee sting.
Anyone have a link to Sinse's Mix for vermicompost? My strategy has been to just uncover my bedding of peat moss, dump my food scraps in there, and just add a 1/2 cup or so of a random amendment, or a bit of everything: kelp meal, crustacean meal, malted barley (whole grains, not grounded), basalt, gypsum, biochar, and oyster shell flour (on the very top of the bedding once the food and amendments are buried). Should I be just putting the food and amendments on the very top? I always bury it about 1-3 inches below the peat moss bedding, as when I put it on the top it makes the worm bin smell foul and just looks and smells bad. Also attracts alot of pests and flies and such. But not sure if I should actually be putting it on top, to get mold and such, which is supposed to be good?
If you tag Os I'm sure he'll share his recipe. I use finished compost and add about 20% shredded bark. Then 1/4 cup each of our normal no-till amendments.That's how I build my worm bedding.I'm lazy and normally just top feed some banana peels,pumpkin or malted barley on top. Sometimes I sprinkle a little worm castings on top of my additions.
Here is the quick version of Sinse’s Vermicompost Bedding mix 2 gallons compost or leaf mold (or peat or recycled soil) 1 1/2 gallons small bark nuggets 1/2 gallon rice hulls 1/4 - 1/2 cup each mbp, kelp, fishbone, crab, neem 2 tablespoons each gypsum, osf Optional 2-4 cups rock dust *the dry amendments use as much as you want really - I switch it up, but what I like to do is use 1/4 cup when I make the bedding, and then add another 1/4 cup when I dump a tray before applying as a top dress. Tip- soak the bark nuggets in a bucket of water the day before building the mix. HTH Cheers Os
About to mix some up in the next few days. From what I understand, you put 1/4 cup on the bottom, then 1/4 cup with the food scraps, then the rest as a top-dress on your worm bin? Just wondering how you apply your mix. Also was curious, rice hulls for aeration, yes? Why not pumice? I'm assuming bark nuggets are for the microbacteria to attach to. I've been wondering where to get good bark nuggets from, here in San Diego. Rip off bark from fallen trees in the forest? (Also I never thought about it, but someone suggested using kelp and eel grass that has washed up on the local shores. The water here seems pretty clean to me. I hear it makes a great bedding. I was researching around for local wild inputs I could use, like comfrey or stinging nettle, but neither of those seem to grow around me).
This is a recipe I run in a tray unit. The recipe makes up a tray that will go on top others. I use 1/4 cup of the amendment list when I initially build the bedding and fill the tray. Half a year later when that tray is harvested (it will be the bottom tray of 5 by then), I dump the tray and add another 1/4 cup of all amendments. Now it’s perfect for a top dress. Because the first round of amendments should be fully broken down, you are able to water in nutrients in their available form. The second round of amendments will be available in 2 weeks or so. You get a really even long lasting distribution this way. This bedding mix doesn’t require additional food, if you don’t want to add it. The bulk of my additional food is banana peels. I actually ran pumice in the first version of this mix. It’s a ways back in this thread. If that’s what you have it works well. That will make a vmc that is better for a soil mix than a top dress. With bark and rice hulls in my mix, I get the bulking and aeration for the vermicomposting part of the process. They of course also supply carbon and become food as they break down. The beauty of rice hulls and bark are they make a great top dress and are great in a soil mix. If you top dress my mix, the castings portion of the mix will flow down into the soil when you water. The bark and rice hulls will remain on top and provide an instant mulch. It’s very slick! In a soil mix bark and rice hulls help the long time soil longevity, aka, they help keep the soil from getting real muddy because it’s all become essentially castings. Once it gets muddy, it doesn’t drain or breath, and that is the big loose. Cheers Os
Thanks Os - very informative post. I'll try to run something like this soon. That's one thing I think about - a no-till pot after a few years of adding top-dressings, doesn't it start to overflow? And like you said, once everything breaks down, it becomes muddy? I think that's why the 40/40/20 mix of pumice/peat/compost is run, I think you might have mentioned it, I can't remember who. With the 40/40/20, would you never need to change out and remix the no-till soil?
With the exception of outside gardening in the ground, I feel that sooner or later you need to just remove everything and start over. But, I’m certainly not implying that the existing soil is no good at that point. Quite the contrary, it just needs to be reworked a little bit for drainage/aeration and fresh compost. If your organic gardening right, your soil volume grows and grows. It’s no accident that I have so many ornamental flower beds. cheers Os
20230129_104616 by LoneYote posted Feb 1, 2023 at 4:43 PM I'm finding what I believe are bulb mites in my VMC bag. From what I've read they're not a big threat to cannabis. Should I be concerned about using my VMC in other applications?
That first insect sure looks a lot like a broad mite. The second insect appears completely different and only has 6 legs - maybe it’s in a pupae stage or something? If that really is a broad mite I wouldn’t use the VC - they are probably the worst pest to deal with. RD
If it weren't for the prominent amber spot on the abdomen, I would agree. I also have another vid showing that the legs are purplish brown, which is another indicator of bulb mites. I'm going to keep looking for ways to rule out broad mites. Never had them and not planning to start. If they were broad mites, I wonder if releasing some predatory mites into my VMC bag would control them? Might be fun to try either way! 20230129_105839 by LoneYote posted Feb 1, 2023 at 7:12 PM
Very interesting. I’ve never heard of them before. I do believe you are correct too. It sounds like they can be seen with the naked eye? This would certainly exclude broad mites. IIRC you are in Arizona? I think we are moving there in the next year or two. I’m excited about how different the gardening will be compared to Montana. One of the first things I’ll do is take a Master Gardener course to learn the cultural practices that I’m completely unfamiliar with. Oh and I found this - doesn’t sound promising. Rhizoglyphus echinopus, Rhizoglyphus robini Common pests of greenhouses and nurseries, bulb mites primarily attack stored ornamental bulbs or ornamental crops in greenhouses. They have recently been found by hemp and cannabis cultivators, which may pose a threat to crop productivity. ARBICO Organics Gardening Supplies and Biological Pest Control Products › ... How To Control Bulb Mites - ARBICO Organics