Red Worm Composting

Grass Clippings Homemade Manure – 06-27-24

Bentley — Thu, 27 Jun 2024 14:49:57 +0000

Earlier in the month, I shared a very simple approach for creating “Homemade Manure” (HMM), using grass clippings and damp cardboard/paper (and a little “living material” for good measure). I ended up leaving that bin to sit for almost exactly 3 weeks, down in my basement, before putting the material to use. As you can […]

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Simple Homemade Manure Using Grass Clippings & Cardboard

Bentley — Sat, 01 Jun 2024 20:37:17 +0000

I’ve recently been writing (to RWC email list subscribers) about the value, and challenges of using grass clippings as a food material in vermicomposting systems. In the past, I’ve always been fairly cautious about recommending its use in typical, small-scale, enclosed systems because it can be tricky to work with – even potentially hazardous for […]

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Bottomless Microgreens Garden (with Worms)?

Bentley — Thu, 28 Jul 2022 19:23:00 +0000

In my “Vermi-Terrarium Wrap-Up” post I mentioned being excited about my plans for the next “hybrid system” experiment – some form of “bottomless” microgreens garden, using the same fridge drawer the last system was in. Well, I’m happy to report that the ball is officially rolling with the new project, after getting things set up […]

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Vermi-Terrarium – Wrap-Up

Bentley — Thu, 14 Jul 2022 18:31:50 +0000

Today I decided to wrap things up with the system I’ve referred to as my “vermi-terrarium”. It never did really become a terrarium (really only kept the name for consistency), but in some ways it actually turned into something much more interesting! As I shared in my last update, I ended up with some big […]

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Red Worms + Isopods for Turbo Carbon-Processing?

Bentley — Wed, 06 Jul 2022 13:16:12 +0000

At various points over the years I’ve become interested in the “composting” potential of other worm bin organisms, namely springtails, isopods and millipedes. I’ve always viewed them as important worm allies, and naturally wondered what they might be capable of on their own. What’s funny is that literally none of my experimental systems in the […]

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Vermi-Terrarium – 06-13-22

Bentley — Mon, 13 Jun 2022 17:01:09 +0000

Last December (2021) I wrote about a weird and wacky experimental system I had started up using substrate and leftover young plants from some (vermi-)microgreens trials I had been running in the fall. I wanted to see how the system would evolve over time with the worms and cocoons and all that nutritious plant matter […]

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Vermi-Terrarium?

Bentley — Mon, 20 Dec 2021 15:27:30 +0000

Earlier in the fall I wrote about some experimental microgreens/baby-greens trays I had set up to test if worms have any sort of obvious impact on the growth of young plants when living in the root zone (jury is still out on that one – but I am continuing to experiment). As some of you […]

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Worms in Microgreens Trays – Update

Bentley — Fri, 22 Oct 2021 20:14:46 +0000

Back near the end of September I learned about someone who has been using composting worms in the grow trays for his microgreens and baby greens (and singing their praise in his YouTube videos). This seemed really interesting and unusual to me, and of course resulted in me wanting to test it out for myself! […]

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Worms in Microgreens Trays?

Bentley — Thu, 23 Sep 2021 20:16:27 +0000

Recently, Shaul G posted in our Worm Farming Alliance discussion group about a YouTuber who calls himself “Papa Blue Shirt”. This gentleman is big into growing microgreens and baby greens…with a twist. He adds composting worms to all his grow trays! Naturally, this caught my attention and I decided I had better check out some […]

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World’s Smallest Bin – Coffee Tub System Update

Bentley — Wed, 22 Sep 2021 13:46:02 +0000

Back at the end of October 2020 I came up with the kooky idea to start up what was easily my smallest worm bin ever – perhaps the smallest worm bin anyone has ever set up? The container used was a tiny toy toolbox…on a keychain no less! (Shown in the photo below) Yep, it […]

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