Tag: worm bin

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UPDATE: Feeding the Worms

I was asked how much the worms could actually eat in a week, so yesterday I took a few pictures when I fed the worms again. Before we start, worms eat food more quickly if it is chopped in small pieces. I used to blend up all of the food each week into “worm soup” and pour it into the bin. That worked very well, but cleaning the blender each time was not so fun, and making the soup used energy unnecessarily. I may start making worm soup again, but only on the weeks I have a lot of food with large pieces (like these last two weeks).

On to the update. You will remember the food we added last week:

Worm-bin-8_29_09-(7)

This week, the bin looked like this: Continue reading “UPDATE: Feeding the Worms”

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Black Gold

No, I’m not talking about oil. I’m referring to the worm castings I harvested yesterday! After picking up some plants from Freecycle I decided to give them a jumpstart in their new home by cleaning out a layer in my worm bin. The bottom layer had a abundance of the dark, rich organic matter.

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The bottom worm bin

To separate the worms, I put the tray in the sun. The worms dislike light and they dug down into the layer. After about 20 minutes I removed the top inch which had few worms in it. Another twenty minutes later almost all had crawled through the bottom of the try and into the container I had waiting for them.

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Close-up of the “Black Gold”

I took the worm castings and put a tablespoon in with the roots of the new plants. Some of my larger holes got more and the tiny single plants got less. After being planted, the plants got a good soaking and the lucky ones got mulch (the mulch ran out halfway though the project). The castings will fertalize the plants and help acclimate them to their new homes.