If you are seriously looking into using red worms for waste reduction, a gardening amendment, or to raise and sell worms then you've probably come across the site redwormcomposting.com. That site has tons of articles about the many different uses for red worms and other worms. Today I was reading a few of the articles and I came across a paper from some university, I'll see if I can find it again and put a link to it, and it gave me an important distinction in the direction worm farmers can take.
The realization came when I found out that there is a difference between vermiculture and vermicomposting. The first, vermiculture, is the act of raising a colony of worms while the second focuses on processing waste and turning it into a gardening amendment. The reason I bring this up is because I was wondering how to feed my worms appropriately. The answer was, of course, "that depends!"
What this has led me to is to focus first on vermiculture. I want a large population of worms so that I can process all of my waste and all the waste of those in my close proximity. In order to do this I need a substantial population. 1 to 2 pounds of worms per square foot of bin area is the recommended amount. So, with this new found information I must redirect my efforts. The day before yesterday I dug a trench and stuck a bunch of waste I had been composting in it. I had planned on adding some worms into it but now, that seems a bit silly. What I expect would happen is that my small population, in regards to the 10 foot long trench, would spread out and not see each other. That would result in slow population growth and overall slow decomposition.
The trench will remain in its current slow decomposition mode for now. I just started a Bokashi bucket. This is what I will be feeding to my worm farm as it ferments down enough. That is going to be a few months down the road. In the mean time I've got to keep feeding the worms. I have plenty of cardboard and junk mail handy but I don't have a ton of nitrogen rich material to add. I am going to have to use some chopped weeds or something. Even the weeds are going to be a little tough to come by since it hasn't been raining at all this year.
I read this morning that pig manure stimulated the most growth in populations of worms. Too bad I don't have a pig! Anyway, the Bokashi will eventually start mass producing a feed source soon enough. I will be able to scrounge up enough waste for my worms to at least sustain there current level, especially since I now know what I am aiming to do.
Just to make sure I am on the same page as myself, my goal is to grow my worm population so that I can sell worms and have a constant flow of nutrient rich castings. I want a vermiculture that also produces plenty of vermicompost. I want the best of both practices. My focus is on growing my current worm population to be able to consume the contents of a trench 1 foot wide, 10 feet long and 3 feet deep. So far I have been spreading them out to thin to allow them to reproduce at a sufficient rate. I need more patience or more money to buy more worms.
One last observation, I built a small bin out of a shoebox sized container and added 50 worms. It has been doing well but I think it would be doing better if I added 500 to 1000 worms. I would like to see my scraps disappearing daily instead of bi-weekly. I have 7 working bins right now. I will take from the less active bins and add those worms to the stackable farm. I will use that farm to create a large population to fill all of my 7 bins to capacity then begin working on expanding. There are 4 trays in my stackable farm, 3 filled and one emptied yesterday. I will add some peat moss to the empty tray and begin feeding there. I have two 10 gallon rubbermaid trays next the stackable farm that have worms. I will take 10 worms per day from there and add them to the top tray. I also have a large tub with a tomato plant growing in it that has no drainage and has chickens eating from it. I found a large cache of worms hiding in there that I will begin transferring over to the top tray as well.
I guess it would be wise to take measurements and see where my experiments are leading me and that is my number one downfall. I am almost incapable of keeping written records. It has always seemed like that was someone else's job to me. I am too good to do that. I think it is really just that I am too lazy and selfish to burden myself with that type of activity and my personal growth will most likely continue to suffer because of this shortcoming. I am enjoying this project on the other levels though. Who'd a thunk I was gonna be a worm farmer?
The realization came when I found out that there is a difference between vermiculture and vermicomposting. The first, vermiculture, is the act of raising a colony of worms while the second focuses on processing waste and turning it into a gardening amendment. The reason I bring this up is because I was wondering how to feed my worms appropriately. The answer was, of course, "that depends!"
What this has led me to is to focus first on vermiculture. I want a large population of worms so that I can process all of my waste and all the waste of those in my close proximity. In order to do this I need a substantial population. 1 to 2 pounds of worms per square foot of bin area is the recommended amount. So, with this new found information I must redirect my efforts. The day before yesterday I dug a trench and stuck a bunch of waste I had been composting in it. I had planned on adding some worms into it but now, that seems a bit silly. What I expect would happen is that my small population, in regards to the 10 foot long trench, would spread out and not see each other. That would result in slow population growth and overall slow decomposition.
The trench will remain in its current slow decomposition mode for now. I just started a Bokashi bucket. This is what I will be feeding to my worm farm as it ferments down enough. That is going to be a few months down the road. In the mean time I've got to keep feeding the worms. I have plenty of cardboard and junk mail handy but I don't have a ton of nitrogen rich material to add. I am going to have to use some chopped weeds or something. Even the weeds are going to be a little tough to come by since it hasn't been raining at all this year.
I read this morning that pig manure stimulated the most growth in populations of worms. Too bad I don't have a pig! Anyway, the Bokashi will eventually start mass producing a feed source soon enough. I will be able to scrounge up enough waste for my worms to at least sustain there current level, especially since I now know what I am aiming to do.
Just to make sure I am on the same page as myself, my goal is to grow my worm population so that I can sell worms and have a constant flow of nutrient rich castings. I want a vermiculture that also produces plenty of vermicompost. I want the best of both practices. My focus is on growing my current worm population to be able to consume the contents of a trench 1 foot wide, 10 feet long and 3 feet deep. So far I have been spreading them out to thin to allow them to reproduce at a sufficient rate. I need more patience or more money to buy more worms.
One last observation, I built a small bin out of a shoebox sized container and added 50 worms. It has been doing well but I think it would be doing better if I added 500 to 1000 worms. I would like to see my scraps disappearing daily instead of bi-weekly. I have 7 working bins right now. I will take from the less active bins and add those worms to the stackable farm. I will use that farm to create a large population to fill all of my 7 bins to capacity then begin working on expanding. There are 4 trays in my stackable farm, 3 filled and one emptied yesterday. I will add some peat moss to the empty tray and begin feeding there. I have two 10 gallon rubbermaid trays next the stackable farm that have worms. I will take 10 worms per day from there and add them to the top tray. I also have a large tub with a tomato plant growing in it that has no drainage and has chickens eating from it. I found a large cache of worms hiding in there that I will begin transferring over to the top tray as well.
I guess it would be wise to take measurements and see where my experiments are leading me and that is my number one downfall. I am almost incapable of keeping written records. It has always seemed like that was someone else's job to me. I am too good to do that. I think it is really just that I am too lazy and selfish to burden myself with that type of activity and my personal growth will most likely continue to suffer because of this shortcoming. I am enjoying this project on the other levels though. Who'd a thunk I was gonna be a worm farmer?
No comments:
Post a Comment