Creating An Outdoors Worm Composting Pit

To create your outside worm composting pit, all you have to do is dig a square hole a couple of feet deep and set a bottomless box, preferably made of wood, into this hole. Create a lid of heavy cardboard or use a piece of plywood over the top of the box which has been placed into the hole.

Once your pit is ready, toss your redworms into this pit and add organic waste. Remember to keep adding organic waste, for your worms will not survive without it. If you keep the pile damp and dark, the worms will do the rest.

The next step is to harvest your compost carefully — in bright sunshine so that the worms will go deeper into their bedding and allow you to harvest as suggested in the previous post about harvesting the castings. You don’t want to dump any of your precious worms along with the compost in ordinary garden soil for they will die without the organic waste as food.

Once fall arrives, you may want to do one of two things. In milder areas, you can make the pit very deep and thickly insulate its walls. However if you live in an area such as Eastern Canada where the temperature goes below freezing, you will have to move your worms indoors to a bin as soon as frost threatens. . . or be ready to buy a new batch of worms in the spring.

Hopefully all this information about worm composting, also known as vermi-composting has helped you create your own setup for harvesting your own worm castings. Let me know via a comment how well you have succeeded with your worms and what results you have had with your plants fertilized with the worm castings or worm castings tea. I would love to hear from you.

Good luck with your vermi-composting!

Marcie

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Best Temperature For Vermi-Composting (worm composting)

Redworms will survive in temperatures from 5 degrees Celsius to 32 degrees Celsius. (40 degrees Fahrenheit to 90 degrees Fahrenheit). However, they prefer it at or above room temperature.

If you keep the worm bin outside in good weather, be ready to bring it in promptly when the temperature drops.

Harvesting the Worm Castings

Removing the worm castings couldn’t be easier. You will notice that redworms hate the light. They’ll wriggle down into their bedding whenever you take the lid off the bin.

Every few months– when the castings outweigh the bedding that remains — place the opened bin under a very bright light and give the worms ten minutes to get well away from the surface. Then the coast is clear for scraping away the worm castings from the top layer.

When you begin to see the worms again, keep the light on them and give them another ten minutes to go deeper still.

Remove the next layer of compost, and just keep going in this way until the harvest is done. Then fill up the bin with fresh bedding and start again.

Although vermi-composting is not difficult, it does require some attention as to bedding, food, and temperature. In return, the worms will reward you with their castings which you can harvest at will to help your plants look better, taste better, grow better — in other words be healthier!

You can also take advantage of the outdoors to build your bin. I will explain how on the next post.

Till then, happy vermi-composting!

Marcie

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First let’s identify which worms are best for vermi-composting. It’s true that earthworms aren’t pets for the squeamish, but they are great little composters! You’ll want the kind of worms that are sold for fishing bait — red wigglers or brandling worms - not ordinary field worms from someone’s garden.

You can get these redworms at a local fishing bait store or special stores which specialize in selling supplies for vermi-composting and vermi-culture (the raising of earthworms for the creation of a healthy soil). You can google “vermi-composting stores” to find the ones closest to you. Canadians, there are now some of these stores in Canada.

Redworms normally live in barnyard manure piles, and feed on fresh organic material. Field worms are better at digesting things that are already well decomposed and aren’t likely to survive in a worm bin on a diet of kitchen scraps.

Your valuable little redworms will live quietly in their dark box and multiply rapidly. Just bury your leftovers in their bedding after each meal.

It is unlikely that you will have too much waste to compost because redworms can eat their own weight in kitchen scraps and bedding each day.

The castings they produce are incredibly rich fertilizer and look like fine textured soil.

For each cubic foot of worm bin, plan on using a half-pound of red wigglers (about 500, depending on their size).

What Should You Use As Worm Food?
Coffee grounds, vegetables, and fruit are excellent food for worms. A varied diet is important. My brother, a New Brunswick fisherman who needs the worms for bait, gathers the worms in the spring, puts them in a pail half filled with soil, and feeds them raw quaker oats, the kind used for making porridge. He’s been doing that for years.

I have used broken up lettuce, celery, carrot greens in my personal very small composting bin. You can read about my experience with vermi-composting at http://www.plantsandgardeningtips.com/worm-composting/worm-castings.

Avoid bones, dairy products, meats, garlic, potato peelings, and other materials which may cause odours, attract insects, or take a very long time to break down.

Egg shells are essential to keep the bedding from becoming too acidic for the worms. Dry them well, crush them, and sprinkle the tiny pieces over the top of the bedding.

You needn’t be too fussy about what food you should give the worms as much as making sure they have plenty to eat. They will reward you with their castings that work so well at making your vegetables and flowers lush, healthier, and tastier.

In the next post we will discuss what temperatures are best for worms and how to harvest the castings.

Meanwhile, stay healthy and happy vermi-composting.

Marcie

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Composting with earthworms or “vermi-composting” is great for apartment dwellers who don’t have yard space and for those homeowners who don’t want to hike through snowdrifts to a backyard compost bin. In addition many kids love keeping hundreds of wigglers for pets.

If you do not wish to build your own home for those worms, there are several companies now who can sell you not only the bins but also the bedding, the worms and all you need.

Covered Bins as Homes for Worms

Your worms can live in a plastic bin or wooden box with plenty of air holes punched in the sides and top. Line the worm bin with nylon net to keep the small ones in. Holes in the bottom are needed for drainage so you’ll want a tray under the bin.

One enterprising young man used a big garbage plastic bin. At the bottom on one side, he cut out a door so that he could quickly retrieve the worm castings without necessarily having to deal with the worms themselves.

Then he bought rods that wouldn’t rust or rot and with the proper size drill, he made holes all around the plastic bin so that he could put these rods through from one side of the bin to the other side. These rods more or less created a platform which was about 2 feet from the bottom of the bin and parallel to it. He made sure the rods were close enough they could easily hold a bedding of damp newspapers to hold his precious worms.

A net under the newspapers would have been an added precaution against losing the tiny baby worms once the newspapers had composted or been eaten by the worms.

Some people move their worms out to a balcony or yard in warm seasons, but I would hesitate putting the bins in the sun for the worms would fry in temperature above 85 degrees Fahrenheit (approximately 28 - 30 degrees Celsius). If you wish to put them outside on a balcony, try to find a spot which remains shaded.

If you plan to move the worm bins back and forth to the balcony, you may find it more convenient to have several smaller, more portable units rather than one large one. The size of the box will also depend on how much space you have.

Worm Bedding Material

Loam or black topsoil available from garden centers makes a particularly good bedding material for your worms.

Bedding can also be shredded newspaper which have been soaked to soften the edges. The newspaper should be damp and not soaking wet when you place it in your “worm’s home” as bedding. Since the worms will eat this too, avoid colored inks and glossy paper.

Other worm bedding material would be a mixture of sawdust, peat moss, shredded leaves, and soil. The idea is to provide your worms with “food”.

Fill the worm bin with about a foot of bedding, about as damp as a wrung-out sponge. Since you have provided air holes all around the bin itself, you can add a lid on the bin to help maintain the correct moisture level.

Now that you know what to use to house your worm and for worm bedding, the next step is to find out what types of worms you can use and what food you might give them. Please go to the next post for this information.
Until then

Happy Vermi-composting

Marcie

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Mulching copies nature’s way of composting on the surface of the soil and gardeners have been doing it for centuries.

Woody, “brown” organic materials are spread in a layer on the ground, over a garden, or around shrubs and trees. Because they are not dug into the soil but decompose on the surface, they don’t disturb the pH balance of the soil or rob it of nitrogen.

Many different products can be used for mulching. My favorite was cedar mulch. It can be used in any flower garden, and a layer of 3 or 4 inches can keep the soil fairly moist even in hot summer weather; in addition, there was very little, if any, weeding to be done where I had spread the mulch.

The best part of having cedar mulch was that it kept the cats away from my flower garden. It seems that cats don’t like the cedar mulch and that suited me must fine.

Another mulch was the cocoa bean shells. It decomposed a lot faster than the cedar mulch, but it gave off a beautiful aroma when it rained.

Now that I am in an apartment and do container gardening on my balcony, I am trying out something different. Last fall I did not cut back my climatis nor did I empty my hanging flower pots.

Although I live on the fourth floor and in spite of the extremely cold winter, I was able to save one rose bush growing in a half barrel container, a climatis and carpet rose in another big rectangular deck box, and lilies in another half barrel by mulching heavily with soil.

This spring, when I cut back my climatis, I took the long stems, cut them up in small pieces, and spread that as mulch in my rectangular container. I did the same with the dead annuals. I cut up the long daggling dead plants into small pieces, and I even took the soil containing the dead roots, broke these root balls into pieces, and spread the pieces as mulch around the perimeter of my containers. These will probably take time to break down so will help keep the soil moist and cool.

Then I went bought a few dozen worms at the bait and tackle store and dumped these into my big containers. Last summer I lost my worms and wondered whether the birds had eaten them. This past winter when I was doing a small amount of worm composting, I discovered that they hate soil with synthetic fertilizer in it. I think the RX15 etc. had burned them.

Now that I have a new batch of worms, I am hoping they will feed on the compost material or even kitchen scraps I will give them on a regular basis. Another option for worm food will be clumps of wet shredded newspaper mixed in with the soil. Hopefully these worms will survive and provide all the fertilizer I need for my main plants in those big containers.

Time will tell!

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What is Rotation Trenching?

Rotation trenching, often used by British gardeners, is a simple three-year rotation of crop, composting trench, and path. Instead of burying compost material in separate holes as done in postholing, rotation trenching involves digging a long pit (usually between rows in a garden) to do your cold composting via soil incorporation.

Year One:
If you are doing your rotation trenching by using a three-year rotation system, begin by dividing your garden into three areas. In the first year, dig out a trench along the full length of your garden, fill with nitrogen-rich wastes, and cover with soil. Use the row next to it to grow crops, and use a third row as a path.

Successive Years:

In each successive year, the fertile soil of the previous year’s trench is used to grow the crops, your new path is where you had crops, and the previous year’s path is used as the composting trench. Thus the garden’s soil is continuously renewed . . . thanks to rotation trenching.

Click on this thumbnail drawing to see an example of how you can set up your rows for rotation trenching in year 1, year 2, and year 3.

Other Options:

Although this rotation trenching composting method demands far less space than a conventional composting system, it does require three rows to grow one row of crops. Each garden will suggest its own variations.

Trenches can be dug under the pathways in use, one section at a time, as the space is needed. In a garden too small for paths, a two-year rotation of crops and trench is fine.

The rotation trenching method is an easy way to do cold composting right where you need to enrich your soil to grow healthier crops . . .

For a healthier you!

Marcie

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Cold Composting by soil incorporation is probably the simplest method of composting. Food and yard wastes are finely chopped, mixed with soil, and buried 200 cm (8 inches) or deeper in the earth.

Depending on soil temperature, bacterial activity, and the carbon content of the wastes, decomposition via soil incorporation, a method of cold composting, will take from one month to a year.

One note of caution, however! High-carbon materials (like raw autumn leaves) are not appropriate for soil incorporation because the decomposer organisms will steal their nitrogen from the surrounding soil.

Leaves may also acidify the soil or inhibit the growth of plants if they are dug into the ground without first being at least partially composted.

The best way to hasten leaf decomposition is to put them through a leaf mulcher first before digging them into the soil. Another option is to run through the pile of leaves with your lawn mower several times before gathering them for the compost pile or for burial.

High-nitrogen materials should be given ample time to decompose underground before the area is used for planting because the decomposer organisms will take nitrogen wherever they can find it while they’re working.

Some people get around the problem of nitrogen loss by adding bloodmeal to the soil before they bury the compost materials. (Bloodmeal is usually easily available from your local nursery.)

Postholing

A post hole digger is a handy tool for soil incorporation, although a spade will do.

The idea is to dig a series of holes around the drip line of trees and shrubs, or in a fallow area of the garden ( to avoid stealing nitrogen from growing plants) and bury organic wastes there.

Postholing is the ideal way to make the compost right where it is most needed. You can use what space you have, then start over where the first load has composted.

If the holes are dug before the ground freezes, you can continue to dispose of wastes in this way all through the winter. By spring, holes are hopefully filled with kitchen scraps, coffee grinds, or tea leaves, etc., ready to begin decomposing via the cold composting method of soil incorporation.

On my next post, I will continue with other methods of cold composting.

Until then…

Stay healthy!

Marcie

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When Should One Choose Cold Composting vs Hot Composting?

Cold composting is a great alternative if you cannot accumulate enough organic waste all at once to create a hot compost pile, or if you aren’t interested in the physical task of turning a compost pile.. or if you have plenty of space and don’t need the compost in a hurry. You don’t need much to start the process of cold composting. The cold compost pile builds gradually as materials come to hand.

Disadvantages of Cold Composting

Although the feeding process when cold composting is less demanding, the results take a long time. You can wait from 6 months to a year for a batch of compost to be produced by this method.

It depends on what goes into the pile: soft “greens” like grass clippings and kitchen wastes break down much faster than woody “browns” or unshredded pieces.

Advantages of Cold Composting:

The biggest advantage of cold composting is that no turning is required. Pile the material in a corner or in a home made pen and the material will eventually decompose. But it’s a good idea to build the pile around an air stack, or to poke it with an aerator tool occasionally to help it along.

General Hints for Cold Composting

First: As with a hot compost, cold piles should be kept moist, and they do need a variety of food material for the decomposer organisms to prosper.

Second: The lower layers decompose first because new material is constantly being added to the top. A compost container isn’t necessary, but it may help you get at the finished stuff on the bottom.

Third: Whatever you choose — a fancy container or a pile in the corner of the yard — compost produced slowly will need to be covered or a lot of its nutrients will be “weathered away” over time. Using a tarp to cover the composting pile is a good idea.

If you don’t protect your composting pile from the weather elements, especially heavy rains, the resulting material will still be valuable as a soil conditioner, but it will not be very effective as a fertilizer.

In the following posts, I will cover the different ways you can cold compost.

Until then, stay healthy!

Marcie

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How to create the New Zealand box – another easy-to-make compost container for hot compost to be used in your organic garden.

Perhaps the best small-scale system for the relatively energetic composter is a design known as the New Zealand box.

This home-made New Zealand hot-compost box is a bottomless wooden box with ventilation spaces between the wall boards, and its face is easily removable to facilitate turning. Since the compost rests directly on the ground, a lid is normally added to prevent nutrients leaking from the pile during heavy rains.

A New Zealand box, or something similar, can be made at home with a minimum of skill. It can be moved to a new location fairly easily if required, and it keeps the compost neatly out of sight.

A popular variation has two or three compartments in a row. The compost is turned from one box into another, and the empty box is then used to accumulate the material for a new batch of compost.

It is ideal for those people who would like to create a compost pile but cannot accumulate that much kitchen and yard wastes to make a really big pile.

There have been situations where the composter used this idea to build just one box and made the box approximately 3 ft wide by 3 ft long by 2 ft high. (1 meter wide by 1 meter long x 3/4 meter high). It worked quite nicely.

So if you are energetic or would like to create hot compost but cannot accumulate that much kitchen and yard waste to make a huge pile, try the abridged version of the home-made New Zealand Hot Compost Box described in the paragraph above. Whether you go big or small, the New Zealand Hot Compost Box is easy to make and easy to use.

Although so far I have focused on compost containers for hot composting, there are other ways to compost. These other methods of composting will be discussed in the next few posts.

Be healthy! Stay Healthy!

Marcie

Be the first to plant this gorgeous Autumn Blooming Cherry

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Home-Made Compost Container –The Compost Drum And The Compost Tumbler

The fourth type of home-made compost containers, the Compost Tumbler and the Compost Drum, are extremely easy to use. A rotating barrel composter can be made from a large drum with aeration holes punched in it . You can also have fins inside the drum to lift and mix the compost materials. A hinged loading door in the side allows wastes to be added gradually.

If bacteria is introduced with a good amount of garden soil and the barrel is turned every few days, compost can be made in a few weeks this way with little physical effort.

Some you must roll on the ground to mix the contents. Others are mounted horizontally on stands with crank attachments. All you need do is turn that crank every day or second day.

You can choose to buy a rotating tumbler which can create compost in as little as five weeks. Here is an example of a top-of-the-line rotating tumbler. This galvanized drum can hold up to 22.4 cubic feet of composting material and sits 27 inches from the ground on a strong steel frame. It is easy to load and is gear driven so it is easy to turn. Various commercial models are available.

Another example is the Urban Compost Tumbler 9.5 Cubic Foot This New Urban Compost Tumbler System Works 90% Faster Requires 75% Less Effort. This unit is the only sealed compost tumbler that allows appropriate amounts of oxygen to enter the chamber and mix with materials vastly increasing the speed and efficiency of composting and inspiring more people to take advantage of the benefits of composting than ever before.

For more ideas about the different styles and prices of compost containers available, check the Amazon.com section found over on the right hand side of my blog.

You now know about 5 different compost containers, some of which you can create with home made material. Each one has its advantages and disadvantages, but for the small gardener, the compost tumbler will work extremely well when it comes to creating a hot compost pile.

There is one more compost container style for making hot compost which I will discuss in the next post.

Till then, stay happy and healthy.

Marcie

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