Garden Maintenance and Landscaping

Go Green with Worm Composting

It’s estimated that last year in the United States, 21 million tons of food waste was burned or dumped into landfills.  The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimated that over 64% of the waste generated in the United States is organic.

Instead of disposing of these materials in landfills, they can be recycled, composted, or
vermicomposted.

You can recycle your waste with the help of worms. Vermicomposting (composting with worms) turns many kinds of kitchen waste into a nutritious fertilizer for plants. When worm compost is added to soil, it increases the nutrients to plants and enhances soil texture and drainage.

Using worms to decompose food waste offers these advantages:

It reduces kitchen garbage disposal costs; It produces less odor and attracts fewer pests than putting food scraps into a garbage container; It reduces the cost of water and electricity that kitchen sink garbage disposal units use; It produces a free, high-quality soil (compost); It doesn’t take much space, labor, or maintenance; It produces free worms for fishing.

What type of earthworm should I use for vermicomposting?

Of the 4,000+ species of earthworms, only half a dozen of them are suitable for
vermicomposting. The most commonly used species is Eisenia fetida (Red wigglers).

Where do I obtain Eisenia fetida earthworms for vermicomposting?

Don’t buy vermicomposting worms from a bait shop. You need at least 1,000 worms, and bait shops only sell about a dozen worms per cup. Buy them in bulk (roughly 1,000 earthworms per pound) from a worm grower.

How often do I feed the worms?

Feedstock throughput in vermiculture is based roughly on how many worms you have. Eisenia fetida will consume 50% to 100% of their body weight per day. Assume the worms will eat half of their body weight each day. The number of worms you have is measured in pounds; there are approximately 1,000 red wigglers per pound . So, one pound of worms can consume half a pound of food per day in the proper conditions.

For more information on composting with worms, visit Garden Paradise Ideas

Growing Organic Worms To Help Your Garden

The main work worms do in your garden is tilling and aerating the soil. They burrow very deep, leaving channels through the soil that break up clods and allow air to enter and water to penetrate and drain away.
In the process of eating at the surface and eliminating lower down, they introduce organic matter to the deeper levels and steadily increase the depth of topsoil. Their main role is to digest decomposing organic matter, converting it quickly into a form plants can use as nutrients.
It is important to maintain good soil structure when gardening organically. Unlike mechanical tillers, earthworms do not damage the soil by inverting it, creating hardpans or breaking up the crumb structure. They never have mechanical breakdowns, they do not create noise or pollution, and they use garbage for fuel – an excellent way to dispose of your kitchen scraps, especially if you live in an apartment.

DIY worm farming
Commercial worm farms are very practical, widely available, easy to use and are quite aesthetically pleasing. You usually buy them with a small supply of worms to get you started. Choose either Red Worms or Tiger Worms. However, if you already have a suitable ‘home’ for your worms you don’t need to spend the extra money.

A pair of old concrete laundry tubs in a shady spot near your kitchen door or close to your propagating area (or both) is ideal. Have the tubs elevated to make collection of the fertilizer easy. Leave the plugs out and put a strainer in the hole so that any excess water can drain.
Fill the first tub with compost and mix in a handful of dolomite or agricultural lime, along with about a half a bucket of soil. Place a bucket under the plug-hole and water this mix with a fine spray until it is quite saturated and starting to drip into your bucket.
Tip in your starter population of worms and cover the surface with an old hessian sack, wet cardboard, old carpet or similar. Worms usually live underground so they thrive in an environment that is cool, dark and moist. You can purchase a tub of 500 – 1000 worms to get started. They are available from professional worm breeders and can be sent through the mail. Many garden supply centres will also have them.
A close-fitting solid lid on your farm will suffocate your worms, so you need to fit a fly-mesh or shade-cloth screened lid to keep out flies and other insects.
For the first month you need do nothing except make sure the farm is kept quite moist, but not awash. Once the farm is settled in you should not need to add extra water. If your farm is exposed to rain, make sure the plug is left out or your worms will drown.
The compost itself will feed the worms for quite a long time, but to get maximum breeding it is best to add some supplementary feed every few days, especially as the population starts to increase. Add a dessert-spoon-full of lime or dolomite to each kilo of food.

You can vary their feed by rotating between:
- a bucket half-filled with water and cow or horse manure, mixed to a slop and poured over the surface;
- a blender filled with household scraps(not citrus or onion peel or meat) blended to a slop and poured over the surface;
- rotten potatoes, pumpkin or fruit, just placed on the surface;
- half a bucketful of new compost, spread over the surface.

Worms also like:
•    soaked and ripped pizza boxes
•    shredded and soaked cardboard, paper
•    leaves, dirt, hair, egg shells
Worms do not have teeth, so scraps should be cut into small pieces – waste from a vegetable juicer is ideal.
Plants from the onion family (including garlic, leeks and shallots) and citrus fruits contain volatile oils. If any of these are included in the food scraps the worms will climb out of their housing to get away from the smell.
Within a few months the tub should be filled with a writhing mass of worms, and it’s time to colonise the second tub.

Half-fill the second tub with the same mixture of compost, lime and soil. Put a strainer in the plug-hole and water the mixture until saturated.
Burrow down to the plug-hole in the first tub and put in the plug. Set a hose to just dribbling into the first tub until it is half-full, being VERY careful not to forget it and fill it right up. Leave the hessian on top to exclude light. The worms in your first tub will all migrate into the top half to avoid drowning.
Scoop them out and, reserving some to put in the garden, transfer them to the second tub. Let the plug out of the first tub and drain into a bucket. You are left with a bucket full of very, very rich liquid fertilizer and a tub half full of worm castings.
From now on you should be able to repeat this process every month or so, transferring about a third of the worms out into your garden or feeding them to the chooks each time. This will also ensure that you always have a supply of excellent liquid fertilizer available as well as the rich worm castings. Your plants will thrive!

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Nature’S Miracle: Gardening ‘Green’ With Worm Castings

Gardeners around the country are increasingly aware of ‘Go Green’ as more than a slogan. As more and more homeowners are devoted to beautifying their yards, they seek ways to maximize their efforts. Most importantly, the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides is becoming less attractive to those who garden. They search for alternative ways to grow their plants, trees, and lawns without the use of toxic pollutants. They are becoming progressively more aware of the adverse environmental impact of these products. Yard runoff flows indirectly to our oceans or seeps into the underground water supply. Chemicals pollute. People are becoming more ‘green’ minded. Hence an increasing demand for organic products. Worm castings and ‘worm tea’ are two of those products.

Worm castings are nature’s miracle fertilizer. They are the end result of specialized worms eating and digesting an organic source such as manure compost. The finished product is worm castings, or more simply put, worm manure. These ‘castings’ are rich in multiple nutrients and minerals providing plants with a variety of essential elements found in nature that they need to grow. They are also an effective soil enhancer. And, most significantly, they are all – natural and toxic chemical free.

In order to see first hand how this process works – how castings develop from a compost pile to market – I visited Legacy Ranch for a first hand look. Legacy Ranch is secluded in the mountains of Campo, California about 50 miles east of San Diego owned and operated by long time rancher and horse aficionado, Lonnie Sole. Lonnie is a ‘cowboy’ in the old fashioned sense and looks every bit like one. Lean and wiry, Lonnie is a no nonsense guy when it comes to ranching. He loves the solitude and beauty of country living. He is at home with the coyotes and other wild creatures that roam his ranch by night and attending his horses and Corriente long horned cattle by day. Doesn’t really like city life at all. Now in his 60’s, he still rides horses regularly and his horses know him by sight.

More than four years ago, Lonnie conceived the idea of producing worm castings for commercial sale. I believe he did so out of curiosity, somewhat from the challenge, but mostly due to his growing concern over the use of polluting chemicals and their effect on the increasingly fragile soil and limited fresh water supply of our good earth. “My worm castings and ‘worm tea’ are nature’s miracle for growing beautiful flowers, plants, shrubs, trees, and lawns safely without toxic chemicals. Plants love it; insects hate it” says Lonnie.

It has not been an easy journey. He started from scratch and has built his operation into a major endeavor. He now estimates he has millions of worms ‘working’ for him. It is an intensely interesting operation and one full of details and watchful care.

Worms can be finicky little creatures. The wrong temperature in the beds, inappropriate food, or any little annoyance can send them scurrying away. And you don’t want to see your investment leaving home. Constant vigilance is required to feeding, moisture content of the compost, temperatures of the beds and the general well being of the worms themselves.

Presently, Lonnie and his workers have three old converted chicken barns that house his worms and the castings. He has installed sprinkler systems and various pieces of equipment to minimize labor. However, worms require an intense amount of attention.  There are lots of hand tools around, too.

He begins by laying out windrows of moistened composted horse manure which he obtains as a recycled product from a nearby horse ranch. Each windrow is about four to six feet wide and the length of the barn, about 200 feet or so. To this he adds his specialized worms, India Blue. They begin work immediately eating and digesting their favorite food. More compost is added to the top of the row as required and as the worms consume what they had initially been fed working their way from the bottom to the top of the windrow. Within four to six weeks they have converted a row of compost to rich and valuable worm castings. It is now harvest time.

Harvesting castings is done largely by hand. A new windrow of composted horse manure is laid down adjacent to the first. Feeding and watering of the initial windrow is terminated and overhead lighting is turned on. The worms, seeking food and water and averse to light, migrate from the first windrow to the new one rather rapidly. What is left in the first windrow is the sought after results of the eager worms ‘work’, rich and beneficial worm castings along with the eggs left behind to hatch later and replenish the stock.

Once the castings are harvested, they are moved to the processing barn where they must be screened. This process removes the clumps that may contain eggs and any uneaten hay or the like from the castings. The final product is dark, rich, dirt – like material. That is the sought after nutrient rich plant food. It has no obvious odor except that of the forest floor or a rich humus soil.

Worm castings may be bagged for direct sale or mixed with a compost to use as a planting medium. They are an excellent natural fertilizer and soil enhancer, 100 % organic and becoming increasingly more popular in the organic gardening movement.

Last year Lonnie began a process of brewing a ‘tea’ with his castings. This is a liquid form of dry castings using natural spring water and other organic ingredients. He brews this concoction for about twenty-four hours in special tanks. He has developed a unique product and it is presently on the market under his own label, “Nature’s Big Bud Liquid Worm Castings, Premium 100% Organic Liquid Plant Food “. He also sells to other independent distributors, farmers, and commercial plant growers. His product is high in microbial content attributed, according to Lonnie, to his use of pure, high quality worm castings, natural mountain spring water and other organic ingredients he is reluctant to discuss. Trade secret. But I know that natural yucca extract is one of them.

His ‘tea’ is becoming a widely sought after garden product. “This cutting edge product will produce superior results for both the home gardener and the commercial grower,” says Lonnie. “We expect superb sales. The general public is becoming increasingly aware of natural, organic gardening without using toxic chemicals.”

Nature’s Big Bud Worm Castings, Inc. spokesmen proclaim their product as “Nature’s miracle for growing beautiful flowers, plants, shrubs, trees and lawns safely without toxic chemicals.” Yucca extract enhances the product immensely, they say, by acting as a wetting agent and it contains natural steroids beneficial to plants whereas the use of natural mountain spring water invigorates the microbes while conveying a multitude of valuable minerals to the soil and plant.

His use of natural unfiltered mountain spring water makes his product unique. He may be the only brewer doing so. This water, straight from a natural spring on the property, is pure and full of essential minerals unlike city water. It contains neither chemicals nor additives. That may be one of the keys to his product.

Lonnie swears by his ‘tea’; he is not alone. A brief surf on the Internet and one can view hundreds of sites pertaining to worm castings and worm ‘tea’. These informative and interesting sites all have one thing in common to the gardening buff: they are gleeful in their endorsement of worm castings and ‘worm tea’. Testing has shown these unique organic and natural products to be highly beneficial. Many noted soil experts are further studying the phenomena, but most agree that there is merit in the claims even though they don’t necessarily know exactly why. There is increasing evidence that worm castings and ‘worm tea’ assist in insect and disease control also. It is strongly believed further testing will prove that out. However, there is little dispute that worm castings and ‘tea’ work! And work well!

I spent many hours with Lonnie discussing his love of worm farming. Several aspects of his efforts were amply evident. Lonnie knows worms. He loves producing a product that is going to help people garden more efficiently and in a manner friendly to the environment. He is not an environmental fanatic, but he knows that chemical free gardening is preferable and somewhat inevitable. The transition to “green” gardening is here and it is real. Slogans are one thing; Lonnie is proactive in his endeavors.

Lonnie loves the land and by all accounts the land loves Lonnie. His worms are promoting a healthy, chemical free environment and that comforts him.

Me, too!