Does anyone have a special way to receive worm castings really fast? Create vermicompost tea?How about the nutrition you feed your worms? After all, this is what's feeding our plants and we want them the best don't we? Of course! Drop a comment and let me know how you use this process. All posts are appreciated.
http://forum.grasscity.com/index.php?/topic/334921-Vermicomposting-(Make-your-own-Worm-Castings)Vermicomposting (Make your own Worm Castings)It's in here.Mj
Apologies out there. I just think when threads have hundreds of pages there should be more. No problem have a good one!
[quote name="The Farma" post="19379487" timestamp="1390304403"]Apologies out there. I just think when threads have hundreds of pages there should be more. No problem have a good one![/quote]Doh!
Use small containers with finished compost as bedding for fast turnover to VC. Don't add any additional inputs other than aeration if needed. (I like rice hulls for this)
[quote name="The Farma" post="19379487" timestamp="1390304403"]Apologies out there. I just think when threads have hundreds of pages there should be more. No problem have a good one![/quote]Nothin wrong with that! Do u have any techniques u would like to share?As gimik said, the fastest turnover will come from compost-only bedding.Bokashi composting can also be used to turn food scraps into castings quickly (mentioned in the link mj provided).Flow thru bins (like in the link I gave) make for fast turnover and easy harvesting of castings.
THAT ^^^ is a really good idea! I don't care for the rice hulls in my container mix, but I'd bet they would be sooooo much better than the perlite in my worm bedding. Gonna give that a shot when I make up some fresh bedding in a month or so. Make 2-5gal buckets at a time. Wet
I'm actually half done with harvesting my big bin, trying to screen out the perlite/silica I had in it from before as aeration. I do not like them at all in the bins; great for plants not so much for worms.
[quote name="thomasmfjefferson2" post="19380441" timestamp="1390324068"]Nothin wrong with that! Do u have any techniques u would like to share?As gimik said, the fastest turnover will come from compost-only bedding.Bokashi composting can also be used to turn food scraps into castings quickly (mentioned in the link mj provided).Flow thru bins (like in the link I gave) make for fast turnover and easy harvesting of castings.[/quote] Hmm, so you use the bokashi compost as bedding for the worms?
Yes that^^ exactly. My first bokashi bucket is almost full.. so I haven't gotten to feed any to the worms yet. But I would treat it like u would any scrap food. Only add a small amount at a time and bury it in the bedding. It is pre-digested... so a fermented banana peel will be broken down faster than a fresh one. Kind of like fast food for ur worms.. I think I would rather use straight compost in the vermibin and throw all food scraps fermented and non outside in the compost pile. This summer I had fruit flies like crazy... don't want to deal with that again.
[quote name="waktoo" post="19386493" timestamp="1390413927"]Bokashi compost for worm food, thermophilic compost for worm bedding.[/quote] So you have to have a bokashi compost, thermophilic compost and vermicompost. Im familiar with vermi and the thermophilic but bokashi is new to me. I searched some and its seems easy, ill give it a go. Ill start the bokashi bin soon, keep my worms going the way they are and wait till things warm up so I can continue the hot pile. How much and how fast do you guys get wormcastings from this process? Im use to just the vermiculture not the others.
looking at getting into bokashi, thinking about applications for it and getting ready to take the dive
I just started bokashi... so I can't say from exp how fast castings turnaround yet.... but I will tell u it is my new obsession..Bokashi is awesome for several reasons and it is really a totally different process from aerobic composting and vermicomposting altogether.Bokashi bran is (typically) wheat bran that has been inoculated with em1. The organisms in the em1 inoculant are allowed to ferment and colonize the wheat bran. Then the bran is dried and the organisms go dormant. When moistened, the organisms "wake up" and go to work breaking down food waste. Em1 is a trademark that stands for "efficient microbes" or "effective microbes".. They are essentially Lacto Bacillus strains and some other beneficial bacteria/archaea. These are facultative anaerobes... that means that they work in both aerobic and anaerobic environments.. but they really thrive in oxygen-poor environments..Unlike aerobic composting, it is a cold process, so none of the chemical energy in the food is lost as ammonia gas, heat or leeching.With bokashi composting, you layer bokashi bran between food wastes in a bucket and try to exclude as much air as possible from the bucket and close it off. The microorganisms on the bran will go to work fermenting the pile. This is a form of lactic acid fermentation. It is very quick and it brings the pH way way down. With the low pH, and the oxygen-poor env, any and all pathogenic organism gets outcompeted for food by the powerful orgs in the em1. This means that you can compost meats, fats, oils, dairy.... anything... all kinds of things that are usually a no-go in aerobic compost.The food wastes are fermented or "pickled" and the end product looks pretty much the same as when it started out. So unlike aerobic compost, u can't plant a seed in some bokashi sludge. It is a method of pre-digesting food waste. You take the finished bokashi sludge and throw it in an oxygen-rich environment like an aerobic compost or vermicompost, and it and anaerobes essentially become "fast food" for the aerobic organisms thriving in the pile.Here is a good link:http://www.prokashi.com/videos/
What's cool is that u can't overload it really, u don't need any space just a bucket, and there's no turning involved. You can just fill the bucket, let it pickle two weeks, bury it in a trench outside, two weeks later plant in the soil around the trench. Couldn't be easier.
Okay, I know I can make my own mix of bokashi bran but im not too sure what to use. Common house hold items preferably, I dont want to order or buy anything.
You can make lacto bacillus serum at home for free.... but I don't know about em1... i've been curious about this as well. If there's anything to buy... it would be a bottle of em1. Then u can make AEM which will extend the life of that bottle a lot. I'm not sure that u can really make Bokashi Bran with lacto bacillus serum alone because there are other important orgs in em1... :s