Worm Farming Recycling with composting worms ecovalleyworms.au Composting organic waste with composting worms, the most effective way of composting organic/green waste Worm farming turns organic waste into a rich, dark earth-smelling soil conditioner, which you can use to improve the soil adding millions of beneficial bacteria or make worm cast teas safe and organic to use on your flower or your vegetable garden. Vermicomposting doesnt just help you, but also the environment. Reducing the amount of waste that goes into land fill. Getting Started Getting started is easy you need compost worms, a container and bedding. A worm Café is ideal and Australian made. You may like to make your own. A polystyrene box makes a wonderful worm farm just put some hole in it as the worms need to breathe. I have found there is no reason for drain holes in the container the household waste like veggies and fruit are moist and there is no need generally to add water to your farm. If your worm farm gets to moist add some leaves or shredded paper. Pouring water through your worm farm leaches out the good bacteria and can make the farm go anaerobic or sour I DON’T recommend pouring water into the worm farm. Aerate often add a sprinkle of dolomite and even a sprinkle of rock dust or garden soil this helps the worms grind the food and adds to the worm cast quality. All worms arent created equal. Dont try using your garden-earth worm. My worm of choice the African night crawler converts more organic waste than any other compost worm I have come across. You may also use other species of composting worm’s reds blues and tigers. Depending on your climate one or more of these species will thrive Now you need composting worms but how many? I recommend a one-to-one ratio 1 kg worms 1 kg of waste or garbage even 2 kg for every kg of waste or garbage. I recommend 250grams per person in the home. You can start out with less, you just need to be care full not to over feed the worms. The other thing you have to keep in mind is that worms multiply. Anyway, if you give them adequate food and a good home they can double their populations every 90 days. So, you may want to start out slow and with fewer worms than you think youll need and the resulting worm population explosion will take care of the rest. In terms of a home for your worms, there are special commercial worm farms you can buy and no, you cant get away with using a generic composting bin .A composting bin will heat the waste too much and the worms will die from the heat. A composting pile can work fine just have an area of soil for the worms to move in to in the heat. It must be made expressly for worm farming. You can also make do with a homemade worm farm or similar type tub and turn it into a worm farm. A bath tub or fridge is innovative and a great upcycle. For the home or balcony a polystyrene box is wonderful you may even like to have a few just remember to feed sparingly until your worm population has increased. Location is important. Ideally your worm farm should be in an environment where the temperature ranges between 15 to 25 degrees this is soil temp not air, worms like a living temp similar to us . I recommend full shade in the Australian summer and morning sun and no frost in winter If you don’t have a tap or drainage shelter from the rain is also important you don’t want your worm farm filling with water. If you do have drainage or a tap make sure your worm farm can drain worms will drown in too much water. Care and Feeding To give your worms a good home, you need the proper bedding that will take up anywhere from one-third to one-half of your farm. In addition to the bedding, youll need to add something gritty -- a bit of soil, sand, The worm need soil or something gritty to grind the food. Worms dont have teeth so the grit allows them to grind up the paper and food and digest their food. When starting doesn’t just drop the worms on top dig in a bit and add to the bedding/soil then place the worm blanket and lid on the farm and give them a day or so to settle. After a few days, your worms will need feed. Feed them fruit scraps, vegetable peels, tea bags and coffee grounds. Avoid meat or meat by-products as well as dairy products and oil foods. The worms will eat these but they may attract flies and maggots. Small amounts of citrus is ok but put it in a scrap bucket to decay a little first worms eat decaying food not fresh food Of course, dont feed your worm’s inorganic waste such as aluminium foil or glass. Also avoid colour-ink newspaper as these dyes can be harmful. Basically use common sense and youll end up with happy worms and plenty of compost/castings. If your worms seem to be eating too slowly, don’t over feed you will have to wait for the worms to breed a bit then add more food if you over feed your worm farm will go anaerobic and smell it shouldn’t smell only earthy. Aerate often Harvesting Castings When the contents of your worm farm have turned to worm castings -- brown, earth-looking stuff -- its time to harvest the castings and give your worms new bedding. Worm castings can be harvested anywhere from two and a half months to every six months, depending on how many worms you have and how much food youve been giving them. Theres more than one way of harvesting worm castings, but one popular method is to move everything to one side of the bin. Then push the partially composed food to the middle and add additional food scraps. Replace the lid. The worms will head for their food. Once theyve relocated to the food pile -- it should take about two weeks -- simply put on a pair of gloves and remove the worm castings without taking out any worms. Once theyve been harvested, replace the bedding with new bedding and put the worms back into your worm farm. The other method is light retracting Place the castings on a flat surface a sheet of plastic is good Spread into a row and heap Leave in the bright sun for 10 or so minutes Remove the castings and the worms will dive down away from the light Keep doing this until you have worms separate then put the worms back into the new bedding and start feeding again on the layer above so the worms can move in and out of the bedding. You now have a bag of worm castings to make worm teas or use the castings as soil conditioner. ecovalleyworms.au
Posted on: Thu, 14 Aug 2014 21:20:16 +0000
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