Archive for November, 2009
I get email every time Google finds a post using the words ‘redworms’ or ‘vermiculture’. (You can set up the same thing with Google Alerts.) I have been letting these accumulate in my inbox, but there are a number of interesting articles showing the wide-ranging nature of vermicomposting, so I thought I’d compile and publish them.
Grand Rapids, Michigan sent a beekeeper to Nicaragua; there he learned vermiculture and now has “a compost pile with thousands of red worms.” In Detroit, Justin Pawloske “[collects] food from two area grocery stores that otherwise would have found its way into a landfill, and [composts] it with the use of worms”.
In Wisconsin, Will Allen of Growing Power uses worms in his composting systems on his urban farms because “[t]he worm castings make great fertilizer.”
A number of schools are doing vermicomposting. In Utah, West Point grade school is “using Red Wigglers to compost cafeteria scraps”. In Ontario, Scott Young Public School is also vermicomposting their cafeteria waste. In Kansas, Starside Elementary has set up vermicomposting systems, where “red worms eat food scraps, newspapers, and even junk mail.” In Ithaca, Caroline Elementary school’s fourth grade class is vermicomposting.
In Pennsylvania, the Haverford House, a part of Haverford College, is vermicomposting.
In the developing world, Spier Hotel, in Zambia, has a “waste-plus-worms-equals-compost vermiculture programme” as well as other sustainability initiatives. They are using Biolytix [PDF], an Australian sewage technology.
In India, villages are setting up backyard vermicomposting and selling vermicompost.
In Guatemala, a non profit considered using vermiculture as a profitable rural enterprise.
In South Africa, vermiculture is part of an “agricultural job-creation project.”
In the Philipines, residents who have been resettled near Bayanijuan plan to “start a vermiculture project.” There’s also a facebook page about a vermiculture project in that country.
In Minnesota, Mark Campbell, a resident of Edina, “tosses his kitchen waste in his vermiculture bin in the basement and uses the “tea” and castings to fertilizer his garden.” He also “ripped up most of the grass in his yard because he considers grass a waste of precious resources”. You can view a video of Mark here, though it focuses on fruit trees and apple crisp.
In Massachusetts, residents of cities with ‘pay as you throw’ garbage collection use vermicompost to save money and process their food scraps.
The Wall Street Journal reviews various composting options, including the Worm Factory, a vermicomposting bin.
In Maine, Redworms for a Green Earth exhibited at the Green Home and Living Show. Redworms were also featured at the Christ Episcopal Church‘s ‘Blessing of the Animals’ in Ponte Vedra, Florida. In California, a real estate blogger covers why vermicomposting is important for green real estate.
And, because this is a blog about worms in Colorado, here’s another great article about John Anderson and his company Garbage Busters.
I also got a lot of fishing reports–apparently redworms really are popular with fishermen!
November 25th, 2009
Melissa, a reader, asks:
Could you tell me what the likelihood of mature vermicast containing plant diseases originating in leaves used as feedstock? I know that properly produced worm tea suppresses/fights plant diseases when applied to plants. However, I read on line that Australian standards for vermicast require some degree of pasteurization of feedstocks for mature vermicast. I appreciate any help you can give me with this.
Also, can worm coccoons drown in worm tea?
Thanks.
Melissa, thanks for writing in! I am afraid I don’t have any firm answers to either of your questions.
First off, as you know, worm composting does not reach the high temperatures that normal composting does. That heat is what kills plant diseases. While redworms have shown effectiveness in dealign with human pathogens, and vermicompost helped supress several plant diseases [PDF], I was unable to find anything directly attacking the problem you have: feedstock infected with a plant disease. If I were looking to sell the vermicompost, or use it on food plants that would come in contact with it, I would make some first and getit tested for the particular disease that was in the feedstock. Then, depending on that result, you could always start by hot composting the feedstock first. (As an aside, here’s an interesting abstract showing the finished product of worm composting and hot composting end up with dramatically different types of bacteria populations.)
Second, I’m not sure whether or not worm cocoons can drown. I found several references on the web to viable worm cocoons floating, but when I put a worm cocoon in water, it sank. I found other conflicting references. Again, in searching, I found some interesting facts (some worm cocoons can survive -8 degree celsius (-22 F) for 3 months, cocoons dehydrate at lower temperatures) but no authoritative studies on the survival characteristics of redworm cocoons. Here’s a forum post from the author of “Worms Eat My Garbage” which indicates that cocoons are not hurt by water:
I have put dozens of cocoons in Chinese takeout condiment containers with non-chlorinated water covering them (to keep them from drying out). I watch daily to see if any baby worms have hatched overnight.
The safest course would be to sift cocoons out before you make worm tea, or perhaps skim off the bottom layer periodically, since hatched worms are known to die in 100% water environments.
These are both fascinating questions experiments; please let me know if you end up experiementing around either one.
November 15th, 2009
The Phillips County Extension office is offering a workshop on vermiculture. Date is unknown, but if you’re interesting in wormkeeping and you live around Holyoke, CO, give Linda a call.
Three other workshops with topics of aquaponics, micro greens and hoop houses and vermiculture will be offered.
For more information or to register contact Linda Langelo at 854-3616.
Read everything in the announcement, courtesy of the Holyoke Enterprise.
November 11th, 2009
Winter is coming, at least in the northern hemisphere, and that means that you need to spend some time thinking about your worm bin. I had a reader (Linda, my future mother in law) as about this.
Now, if your worm bin is inside, the only thing you need to do is make sure it can handle your food waste. If you have been splitting your feeding between an outside and inside worm bin, or an inside bin and a compost pile, then the inside worm bin probably doesn’t have the population to handle all your waste. Up the feeding slowly, and throw some of your food waste away.
If, like me, you have an outside worm bin, then you will want to do a couple of things.
- Clear out some of the vermicompost and castings. This is the perfect time to do so (or, maybe last month was). Your worms have been working hard all summer, and you’ve probably had the chance to give them a lot of food. You might have been so busy enjoying the summer that you let them fill up their bin. I took out about 18 gallons of worm castings and vermicompost (and I’m sure, a few worms and cocoons) from my worm bin, and put it in my garden for next summer. This will open up space for you to feed the worms for the winter.
- Make sure the worms have the ability to ‘go to ground’. If your compost bin is in contact with the ground, the worms can retreat into the ground if the bin starts to get cold. This is good advice for the summer as well. If you have an independent bin, you can bury it in the ground a bit. If you have your worm bins on a balcony, you might want to bring them inside, at least on any nights where it is going to be freezing for a long period of time.
- Make sure you can still feed your worms. Your worms can last for weeks without food, but not months. Also, the composting of the food can provide some warmth to counter balance the cold.
- You can provide them insulation (here’s an example of using straw to insulate against the Canadian winter), but make sure you can get in and feed them at least once every couple of weeks. I insulate them by making sure plenty of leaves are on top of their food. (Fall is also a great time to pick up leaves to provide bedding for your worms all next year.)
That said, I live in Boulder, Colorado, where we have some cold weeks and some warm weeks every winter. (We’re USDA zone 5.) And by warm, I mean ‘above freezing’. If you live in zone 8 or zone 9, you probably don’t have to worry at all. And if you live in zone 1 or 2 and want to keep worms outside, I’d suggest heavy insulation, or moving them to the garage.
November 5th, 2009
