worm farm tips

[boomstix]

hi everybody

 

i just did a quick search and found a few good things but i was wondering if any of you experienced fellas have any tips for a newbie worm farmer.

 

like, things to watch out for, things to remember, that kind of thing.

 

i'm pretty fired up to join the worm farming revolution and i just want to be up to date so my worms will be happy and healthy.

 

one question i'd really like to answer is, can i grow in pure worm castings or is it essential to mix them with other things?

 

also, the worm juice that comes out is good for liquid fertilizer they tell me, if it is diluted.

if it isn't diluted enough (or not at all) will it burn plants or harm them in some way?

[louise]

1. can i grow in pure worm castings or is it essential to mix them with other things?

 

You'll need to mix the castings with other materials, alone it will be too dense... not enough air for canna roots to be happy.

 

2. if it isn't diluted enough (or not at all) will it burn plants or harm them in some way?

 

It will burn roots if undiluted... IIRC dilution is around 1:10 for heavy feeding crops.

[boomstix]

thanks lou lou

[boomstix]

thought i might give an update on how things are progressing.

 

we scored some worms from a couple of mates and got them settled in about a month ago.

 

they are happily munching away and i've already harvested a good amount of worm tea.

 

i just poured water into the worm farm and it washes out as a tea looking liquid. this is the organic fertilizer and the reason i'm farming these critters. it seems to be pretty strong because i diluted it to about 10 to 1 before i used it but a few of my herbs are showing signs of mild nutrient burn. next time i will dilute it a bit more.

 

this seems to be a good way to make my own organic nutrient.

[Reverend]

When you dilute it best way to judge it I find is to make it so it looks like weak tea.

 

Never put in citrus or anything from the onion family.

 

Once a month sprinkle a little dolomite onto the farm keeps it fresh.

 

I put in horse manure and sheep but not fresh and hot. Also the veggie peelings i put into an old blender that I got from a hock shop. Depending how many worms you have don't put so much food in there that it isn't gone in a 24 hour window.

[Bubba]

Hiya Boomstix, I have a big ol' worm farm in my garage, here's some info that I've obtained through experience.

 

i just poured water into the worm farm and it washes out as a tea looking liquid.

 

When you run water through the farm like that, it leaches some of whatever castings are in the bedding. Worms don't like to be this wet, in fact, the bedding should only be so moist as to drip occasionally - mainly after you hydrate it when the top is too dry. The worm farms that you see for sale often have a tap on them at the bottom. This gimmick is misleading in two ways: Firstly, it implies that worms give off liquid fertiliser. They don't. Sure, they secrete liquids along with solid castings, but these liquids will be absorbed by healthy bedding. If your bedding is dripping constantly, then it's too wet. Saturating it to the point of runoff is making your worms too wet. If you want liquid fertiliser, avoid having a soggy bedding, and simply mix a handful of castings into a gallon or two of water.

 

You mentioned that you thought the castings caused nutrient burn, I don't think this is so. Castings are one of the slowest released fertilisers in nature. This is because they are essentially a humus, that is, completely finished decomposed organic matter. From there, it breaks down quite slowly. The breakdown of course is what releases nutrients. Combined with a relatively low NPK (significantly under 1-1-1 in most cases) and you have a product that releases food ever so gently to the surrounding soil. I can't comment on your soil ecology because I don't know anything about it, but castings are extremely stimulating to the soil microbe population. If you experienced nutrient burn, it may be because of a spike in microbial activity releasing a large amount of previously unavailable nutrients, directly stimulated by the castings. That's just my guess, though.

 

Other things that have worked... get spent coffee grounds if you can. Mix it with a handful of aged manure (like Reverend said, no fresh poo!) and cover your food scraps with that. The worms get into it like nothing else that I've used. They don't really go for straight coffee, though this is just in my experience.

 

If you find you have too much food on hand for your worms, and you are having to throw it out, or they are taking too long to eat, try this... mix your foodscraps in with some carbon matter from the yard (leaves, aged grass clippings) and let it compost for a bit. It will only be a few weeks before most of the food scraps are unrecognisable. Not finished compost, but well on the way. Feed this to your worms once it reaches this stage. It will be far easier for them to digest. If you haven't composted before, be careful, it's very easy to add too little carbon. If at any point the compost starts smelling like shit (not mold or spoilt food, but nasty shit sludge), it has begun anaerobic decomposition. This is bad - anaerobes create toxins that have no place amongst your worms or garden. Aerating the mix and adding more carbon will quickly solve this problem should it arise.

 

As soon as the original bedding has been eaten (2-3 months), you will need to start again. You cannot indefinitely keep feeding worms, as soon as they use up their bedding, they need more. You can start a new colony by saving your worms, or using a handful of worms and castings to seed the next batch. Another method is to scrape the castings to one half of the container and fill the remainder with fresh bedding, assuming the worms will migrate out of the castings. I did this twice, and some will leave the castings, but not all. Not good enough. Make the effort to save most of your worms, it's not hard, and your new colony will take off much quicker. Just dump out the entire lot onto a tarp that gets some sunlight, but won't be exposed to rain. Make a neat pile of it. The worms will retreat further down into the pile as the exposed area dries out and isn't protected from the sun. Scoop off the vacated layer of castings, stopping once you start to see worms again. Do this once a day, or whenever you can, until you've harvested 70-95% of your castings, whatever you have patience for. It's probably not a good idea to let the castings sit for any longer than 2 weeks, though. The worms will quite predictably burrow away from the light every time, and won't make any attempt to leave the pile if it's completely on the tarp. If you do it right, you'll end up with a writhing mass of worms and just a few handfuls of castings.

 

Have fun!

 

Bubba

[boomstix]

hi Bubba, thanks for the info.

 

do you think watering the farm to get the nutrients out is not good for the worms? I thought that they might not like it because of the cold. if they were outside they would get rained on from time to time though.

 

i let all the water drain out straight away, so the farm is not full of water.

 

that stuff about the microbial activity is very interesting. that's exactly the type of living soil that i'm trying to move towards. I haven't had any problems since the first time and all the plants in pots are looking very happy. they are just fed on the worm tea at the moment.

[mull]

Some great advice here.

 

Things I learnt to definitely not feed them - chook pellets, dynamic lifter or chook shit (no meats either)

 

They love aged bat guano. I haven't had any trouble with horse manure, even steaming..

 

If you can get a stacked worm farm, or make one, then you can encourage most worms to migrate up to compost food in the top tray, once their working tray is all castings.

 

Then harvest the lower tray of castings as the others said, to use say a small handfull per watering can.

Or, perhaps get a poly drum (with tap) and liquify the whole working tray into it. I use an old colander to catch most of the worms left when doing this.

And make up your teas from the drum straight out the tap. Drum method avoids bringing pests like gnats indoors with fresh castings.

 

Try not let the farm get to hot in summer.

 

Also activate compost heaps with a handful of your farm worms. Best of luck.

[boomstix]

hi mull, yeah i have been putting a few baby worms into the compost heap and some got washed into my herb pots as well. hopefully they will survive and prosper there.

 

in Radic's worm farm tutorial he talks about watering the far to get the nutrients out easily.

 

http://www.earthreggae.com/yard/forun/Grow...Harvesting.html

 

it seems like the worms are handling it ok so far and i've watered them a few times. do you guys water yours? i don't want to be cruel to the little fellas if i can avoid it but to my mind it seems no worse than a quick rain storm.

[Bubba]

Hey Boomstix, flushing worm farms seems to be fairly common, so if you are doing it and your worms are thriving, then it should be okay. Worms are pretty tolerant and it sounds like you aren't letting it stay permanently saturated.

 

I'm not big on it because I don't like saturating the bedding at all. I keep it moist. Sure I water the woms, just not much - a little spray on the top once a week usually does it in winter, two or three times in summer.

 

If you can get a stacked worm farm, or make one, then you can encourage most worms to migrate up to compost food in the top tray, once their working tray is all castings.

 

Then harvest the lower tray of castings

 

Word. This is the best way to harvest castings... let the worms migrate into fresh bedding. Stacked worm farms are easy - you just get 3 of the same type of crate, drill them full of the usual drainage and aeration holes. Start with one crate of bedding, when the worms have turned it, put place a fresh crate on top and feed through the top of it, the worms will move in, when they've turned that, put a third on top... takes a while but after 6 months you'll have a good little harvest cycle going... and no sifting castings.