Backyard Farming the Natural Way

As a result of moving, it’s been quite a while since I have posted an update concerning my composting worms.  Fortunately, I was able to take the wooden worm bin that I constructed with me, and so far I have gotten many loads of worm castings  from this setup. You can find the original plan sequence here DIY Stackable Worm Composter.  Referring to the photo, I am  reaching down just below the surface and you can see the substrate is absolutely full of worms.

In the top pic,  the bottom of the bin is now full and so I have placed the top section on and am beginning to fill it up with kitchen scraps.  Because I have been in a hurry lately,  I have not spent the time to chop up the scraps like I should (to optimize worm food availability).  Nevertheless, I am not too concerned at this point because until I move from my current rental  into my new place, I currently have more vermicompost than I know what to do with!

Also,  I think the worms really dig all the egg shells that I feed them.  Because I don’t have many vermin around, I don’t wash the shells and I think the added protein is a nice touch to the other vegetative kitchen scraps (though the shells obviously need to be crushed better, but oh well).

When I finally get settled, I think I am going to implement an idea that I read about concerning using a cheap garbage disposal mounted to a board outside, and then having the outlet exit into a 5  gallon pail.  By using this method, I think I could get twice the worm yield than I am currently getting with my lazy approach of placing the food in whole.  Finally, I do add some occasional newspaper, cardboard egg containers, and certain leaves in for bedding. Till next time, ‘worms away!’