Worm Farming anyone doing it?

[DUSTYCEDAR]

is anyone growing there own worms to get the castings?
if so how big or small is your setup?
how has it been working out for ya?

[Smallaxe]

I hope we are all growing worms in our various lawns :)

[desert rose gardening]

Not me but I have a friend who was giving it a try a few years ago. It was a lot of start up money and hard work on weekends hauling horse poop around. It was a group venture about 4 families, they would work on a different ranch each weekend. He got out of it and spent a lot of money and time and never made a dime. They hired a marketing company and still could not find buyers

[ICT Bill]

I have a lot in my compost pile and the Robins are constantly in the yard yanking them out of the ground.
I would like to try a small backyard worm farm this year. There are several good sources of worm castings (poop) maybe Tad will jump in here and tell us about some, I believe he is the poop master LOL

[Tim Wilson]

If you wish to keep composting worms for a supply of vermicompost, it is quite simple. I use red wrigglers but there are other varieties. You can keep them in bins, or other specialized containers now on the market or in a pile of material.

If you wish to start a small bin, say 18 inches high X 15 inches wide X 24 inches long, begin with about 2 pounds of worms (2000 worms). Just get a plastic storage bin and poke some holes in the bottom and bottom corners for air/drainage, line the bottom with a piece of landscape cloth, put in some moist bedding/food (paper strips, wood shavings, peat moss, horse poo {they love horse poo}, brown leaves, used coffee grounds, banana peels, etc. No Citrus). Place your worms into about 2 to 3 inches of the bedding/food and cover them over with another 1 inch layer of moist bedding. Keep moist! Put holes in the lid for air and put it on. When you see that they are eating their way through this, place in another layer on and on until the bin is full. Look at the material to be sure it is a rich dark color. If not leave the worms in to finish the job. You may stir it up once in a while to aerate. If you see little springtails and mites in the bin, this is a good sign because they work in harmony with the worms. It should take about 2 to 4 months for the bin to fill. Then you trap the worms out by using one of those mesh trays for carrying transplant pots filled with their favorite food. I use wet peat mixed with coffee grounds/banana peels. Place it on top covered with wet newspaper (you probably can't get the lid on at this stage) The worms enter through the holes. It usually takes 3 to 5 days and you snatch the trap off and put them in a new bin or aside while you empty and start over. There will be stragglers to grab and eggs that are smooth yellow/brown grape seed sized that you can choose to pick out or not. Each egg/capsule contains up to 3 worms. If conditions are good your worms have multiplied enough to split into two bins. And on it goes.

If you wish to use the pile method; We live in a cold winter area so we put our worm pile in a barn with a concrete floor (gravel & lime actually). The barn is 16 X 24 feet and we fill it up in early summer 4 feet deep with horse and or cow poop mixed with wood shavings and or peat and bits of straw/hay/leaves/paper/whatever. We wet it down put our worms (2000 pounds?) in and cover it over with wet cardboard and keep it moist. We have a few lights in the barn which keep the worms from travelling. They don't like light. Around April/May we trap the worms and harvest our beautiful vermicompost packed with beneficial microbes. If we make CT with it we spread out the used compost in our gardens and the eggs hatch out so we fill our soil with worms. They say that red wrigglers don't stay in soil but that has not been our experience. They eat up the dead organic matter and produce castings right there in the garden. You can even spread out wood shavings or paper for them to eat.

Salutations,
Tim

[DUSTYCEDAR]

sounds great thanks for the info

[ICT Bill]

That is sooooo cool, I'm not sure why I get excited about this, but I do. Maybe one day I can wear the pin "wormmaster" like Tim.

I don't think our homeowners association will allow me to do it on Tim's scale, whatya think

[DUSTYCEDAR]

some people have pools some worm farms :)

[Newby08]

haha thats pretty good, i think my family and nieghborhood would lean more toward the pool

[Kiril]

I don't think our homeowners association will allow me to do it on Tim's scale, whatya think

I say you get a 10 foot long plastic worm, put it in your front yard with a sign -> Wonderful Wigglin Worms :laugh:

[DUSTYCEDAR]

well i am going to do it got 5k worms comming and cant wait

[Exact Rototilling]

Red worms are great for kitchen composting however in colder climates they need to be kept from getting too cold or they will perish. Same for excessive heat. There are some web site online that have some fairly elaborate systems for keeping them alive outdoors or in a garage. Red worms do really well in captivity. Night crawlers, the one in your lawn & garden, don't do well in captivity and don't consume as as broad of a range of waste etc.

Just need to figure out a way to offer this as an up sell to my clients. payup

Free worms with each garden tilling?

[Prolawnservice]

well i am going to do it got 5k worms comming and cant wait

This is my 3rd year, I started with 2000 worms and have split them off into two bins. One I keep in my greenhouse/sun-room in a worm bin I bought on eBay for $60 or so. One I made myself out of a Rubbermaid trash can outside, they both work equally well, the worms don't seem to care which one they are in. I'm experimenting with leaving them outside for the winter, I read that the adult generation will freeze and die but the eggs will keep and hatch in the spring. Guess I'll see, didn't have room for the second bin indoors so hopefully it works, If not the inside ones will need to be split again in the spring anyway. Maybe I'll try Tim's pile method next year.

Its cool to see all the life that just seems to appear in the bin. When the worms are happy they seem to crank out the babies too. The mites did tend to freak out my wife a little but they don't spread, they pretty much keep to the bin, so shes OK with them now.It still amazes her that all those food scraps go in there and it never smells bad.

[ICT Bill]

Prolawnservice
What do you do with the worm castings?

I always wondered, how do you get the worms out of the castings

I heard that barefoot james who comes on this site just bought 500 pounds of worm castings, I guess its called vermicompost, to make compost tea with

[Prolawnservice]

So far, I've mostly put them in my vegi garden, last year I brewed some tea twice as an experiment, which seemed to work well. I don't have a microscope or the skills to really tell whats going on in the tea. I may do some more along those lines this year, In the 2 years I've had them I've only harvested maybe 80-100lbs of castings.
When the castings are ready I try to get as many of the worms to migrate up to another tray, similar to Tim's method. Then I dump out the castings in a cone shape with a flood light over top and pull castings from the edge. As you pull the edges the worms that are exposed will squirm inward more until eventually you have a pile of worms left on the table. Then they go back in the bin with the others.

[DUSTYCEDAR]

well lets see pics of your worm farm inside

[Newby08]

I would like to also see some pics of some of your tea brewers also

[ICT Bill]

Exact
What do you do with those rototillers? I have some interesting info from the no till meeting in North Dakota last weekend

[Prolawnservice]

This is the one I bought on eBay, I'll snap a few pics of mine tomorrow, My tea brewer is a old stocking in a 3 gallon plastic water bottle with the lid cut off, a fish tank pump with two outlets one aerator stone in the stocking suspended in the center of the bottle and one on the bottom.

here's the link to the eBay worm bin,

http://cgi.ebay.com/Worm-Factory-Farm-5-tray-Garden-Compost-Bin-NO-RESERVE_W0QQitemZ270211036981QQihZ017QQcategoryZ20540QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

[Prolawnservice]

OK here is the pics of the worms, the tea stuff is put away and the description is pretty self explanatory

[Newby08]

awwww... there so cute!

Thats a red worm?

So your not trying to get compost your just trying to raise worms correct? What will you do with them? deposit them in your customers lawns?

[Prolawnservice]

pointing to an adult worm with a few younger ones in the background

[Prolawnservice]

Here is a worm egg usually they are a little more yellowish.

[Newby08]

all kidding aside that is pretty cool, the casting is the poop correct? what is different about that and the soil itself when it comes to compost, why seperate? why not just keep it all together?

[Prolawnservice]

This is the outdoor bin, the bottle that's catching the leachete is also the same type that I cut the top off to brew tea in.

[Prolawnservice]

I didn't see if Tim mentioned this or not but the smaller you chop up their food the quicker they eat it. Also its better to feed them a little every day than alot once a week. Once last tidbit, if you freeze your fruit and veggies first your will have a much lower chance of breeding fruit flies. I blend, freeze, and then microwave their food if fruit flies start coming around, so far besides the mites freaking out my wife temporially the fruit flies on and off sometimes is the only problem I've had. One time I put too much ash in the bin but that was more a problem for the worms than me, it burned them a little, but they got over it.

[Newby08]

leachete...

I take it that is the nice juice that comes out after everything has settled? I know when i was cutting grass if I let the clippings stay in the hopper of my Walker there would be some God awful smelling grass juice come out of the bottom. I always wandered if that stuff had any benifits?

[growingdeeprootsorganicly]

newby08,
the grass stinking in the walker bin is not what your after cause when you compost there's a there's a thing called carbon to nitrogen ratio, carbon is brown things like (dried brown grass)fallen leaves,wood chips,cardboard,hay,ete you need both at different amount's like 30 to 1 to make good compost to start, finished compost is about 10 to 1 after it breaks down

green grass is mostly n other (fresh)greens types of material have a lot of n so the combination between both is important, other things that have high n like manures are really good n sources as well,
the ratio to start is impotent so that's how you figure out how to make the pile.

without the carbon, strictly n material's heat up to much and to fast(eating up oxygen) The bacteria breaking these things down are causing the anaerobic(oxygen depleted) conditions like whats going on in the walker, that smell of ammonia is a result of anaerobic bacteria giving off gasses,

the bacterial growing in there aren't good, some might be useful but you need others(aerobatic)bacteria for a healthy diverse environment for good compost.
you could compost just the clippings alone since they have carbon in it but it takes many months and you have to turn the pile all the time cause it's so matted together you don't get good air flow resulting in an anabolic compost,
you what a aerobatic compost,(hope this made some sense to you as I'm still learning also)

prolawn,
did tim explain that the pile method can keep the worms warm if you add n sources to the pile so some true thermophile composting takes place?
i read if you control it right and put that type of compost in the middle of the pile it can keep the whole pile warm and the worms will adjust them selves according to the heat so they won't die, not sure how big the pile has to be though?

[Newby08]

that made since... still don't know what the liquid stuff was though unless your saying that was the n leaving the pile... but let me run over it real quick just to be safe...

the brown dead grass was basically all carbon. The green color that was there when i first cut the grass was n that I was seeing. Makes since being when you throw n down the grass gets greener. The pile stunk because there was no air movement for the beneficial bacteria to break down the left overs. There was some bacteria but not exactly the kind that I'm looking for. That explains why the material will still decompose but not nearly as quickly. I want green stuff for my compost. Not exactlly sure why, but I'm guessing its better food for the beneficial bacteria. The pile also needs to be turned in order to keep the air moving throughout the compost.
What about this... if I have a big pile of compost could you take a long PVC pipe or any other material... poke a lot of big holes in it and have the pipe go into the bottom of the compost and stick out the side to allow air to move through? Maybe it will need some kind of pump to help supply a sufficient amount. Then that just adds cost to being able to make compost.

Thanks

[Newby08]

by the way, what are the advantages to vermigrant compost as to heated compost? which is easier and which would you prefer?

[growingdeeprootsorganicly]

newby08,
if your talking about the liquid leaving the vermicast bin it's just the excess water filtering through the compost and it picks up some minerals and material on the way through,
from what i understand it's good to use but i think it can be anabolic since its just still water sitting and collecting and the nutrient value isn't as high as the castings them selves still worth using in some cases from what i hear. you have to keep the bedding real moist for the worms so you use a lot of water doing that so some leech's through.

n does make grass green but there's more to it then that to make grass green.

you could set up piping through a pile but it's not necessary, thats why you turn it every once in a while to get air in to it.

the first few months you really need alot of air, as the pile slows down , i would think it o2 requirements lesson but it still needs plenty of air,, though thats why you turn it

most of your questions can easily be answered and better answered just doing google searches

[Newby08]

yeah but whats the fun with that?

lol, I'm sorry, I've kind of gotten use to the idea that if I can just ask someone why go searching through all that mess trying to find an answer? I'm not that computer literate and lose interest pretty quickly.

Is that bad?

oh, and this liquid was more than just water... it had to be, It got on my trailer a few times with the 2X6 wood and there is still a stain to this day. And its been a few years.

[DUSTYCEDAR]

the more air u get into the pile the faster it breaks down and the pipe idea is a good one it is being tried at a local univeristy so i am told.
i have a pile about 40 yds or so and i dont trun it enough but when i do it breaks down way faster.
i want to add some of the drain pipe with all the holes in it to the pile and see how it works out.

[growingdeeprootsorganicly]

newo8,
I thought you were asking about the water leeching from prolawn's worm bin but it's just like the same thing for the grass in the walker too.

questions are good but, if you need EVERYTHING spelled out for you, and your not willing to do your own research, you'll never succeed in this biz.
no one said it's going to be easy to learn.

please don't take offense to what I'm saying but it's the truth

[Newby08]

no, I completely understand and don't think I don't do any research. I was just saying some things are easier to ask... if they don't have an answer then I'll find one myself. But if I have something like this with all the seasoned veterans who obviously know their stuff then I'm definitely going to take advantage of it.

newby08,
if your talking about the liquid leaving the vermicast bin it's just the excess water filtering through the compost and it picks up some minerals and material on the way through,

Yeah, I missed that part, sorry you were right.

Thanks for the info you and everyone else provide by the way, its very insightful.

[Prolawnservice]

the more air u get into the pile the faster it breaks down and the pipe idea is a good one it is being tried at a local univeristy so i am told.
i have a pile about 40 yds or so and i dont trun it enough but when i do it breaks down way faster.
i want to add some of the drain pipe with all the holes in it to the pile and see how it works out.

If the pile gets hot enough Plastic pipe will melt, you better off building the pile around a few pipes then pulling them out just leaving the air hole behind. I know there is research being done on using heat from composting but in that they use metal pipes.

[Newby08]

Prolawn, do you think that if it were a metal pipe and you stuck it in there with holes through out that it would alow more air to flow through? or would it be too busy pushing out the heat for any air to come out? When you pull the pipes out wouldn't the holes just collapse?

[growingdeeprootsorganicly]

newby08,
go look up composting you will see how people do it, as long as you have lots of different browns like shredded wood leaves ete. with different shapes and surface areas you should have enough air spaces, but whats really important is you monitor-( temp., smell, progress) -the pile and turn it with a pitch fork,

even if there isn't good air flow cause of materials you can add air by turning.

you do need it to heat up, faster decomposition but not to hot cause it could get to 200+ in temp and kill the good micro's but at one point in time it does have to get up to over 150 for thee weeks strait to kill human pathogens.
you can control temp by turning it-(you will need a compost thermometer)
-inside out, like i said look it up cause that way you can FULLY UNDERSTAND what your tying to do

[Newby08]

what is with you and this research stuff? lol

[hunter]

Here's a site that sell vermicompost bins

http://wormwigwam.com/large_systems.htm

I've been looking at them for a while and thinking about buying one.

[treegal1]

we have 2 8x 24 foot beds and love the casting for tea, feeding them is work, but we don't have a waste stream and make $ doing it. 4000000 worms eat about7 -10 tons per week and we harvest 6-7 tons at a time

[Newby08]

holly crap thats seems like thats a lot... when the castings come out they don't have to be used right away do they? you can store them for later use right? I love the idea... what all do you feed them?

those farms look pretty cool and effecient, I like how you don't have to spend a lot of time with them and the CT brewers look pretty good too.

[treegal1]

The compost I described earlier.Shoot me an e-mail or come and visit to see the whole program in action.

[Newby08]

is that jensen beach or jensen place florida? I take it you live in jensen place by the looks of the areal image on mapquest.

[treegal1]

no jensen beach 34957 Your looking at a drive 8-9 hours 575 to 75 to I 10 (becareful here ) to I-95 south to 101

[Newby08]

wow, thats down there... it was 6 hours to jensen place... huh, it says its only 9 hrs to get to jensen beach... how is it down there pretty ocean? nice beaches?

[treegal1]

The best beaches haven't changed since I was 8.We live in an interesting ,unique ecosystem ocean one side Indian river lagoon on the other

[DUSTYCEDAR]

wow that is a lot of worms at work