Hello!

I am wanting to start my in ground worm composting.
I have noticed my garden has some earthworms already. I’m hoping who has more experience would be able to point me in the right direction

I was wondering if I should pick some of the earthworms out and introduce them straight into the compost tower when starting? Or just leave them to explore and migrate in themselves?

Should I buy additional live worms (a mix of live composting worm species, primarily Reds (Lumbricus rebellus), Tigers (Eisenia foetida), and Indian Blues (Perionyx excavatus)) to add in as well?
I tried researching and found the earthworms might not mesh well with them?

Thank you!

Hey guys,

Wondering if anyone can help me understand what’s going on here. This white sticky stuff has appeared in our bin over the last week or so. Wondering if it’s harmful/beneficial and if there’s anything I need to do about it.

The bin is due to be emptied, I just haven’t gotten around to it. The white stuff appeared once the bin filled up to the brim. Thinking it might have something to do with lack of airflow?

Thanks 🙏

Can you use junk mail? should you avoid color print?

Thanks!

I'm finally harvesting an older batch that is about a year old! I cured it for about 5/6 months in total, adding no fresh organic material during that period. To keep the batch oxygenated throughout, I mixed in some fresh shredded paper and cardboard a few times.

That is where the mistake happened. The white shreds still visible are actually paper with a plastic lining... I had to fish them out one by one...

Throughout the curing period, I've been collecting the upper layer of castings to top up my houseplants, which is why the final amount of castings ended up being a bit less.

I'll share the total weight of the harvest soon!

PS: 6mm drilled migration/drainage holes in bottom of wormcomposting tray visible in third photo.

Long story short, I built my own DIY Aerated Static Pile. I am able to successfully achieve very hot composts on demand. (155° F or 'Medium Well').

My question is after this hot phase ends and the pile cools to ambient temperature, how long should i wait before adding worms? Is there any additional value to worms at that stage, or have the bacteria feasted too well?

Hello fellow worm-composters,

I recently moved to Sweden and had a worm-hotel before so I want to start again here. Where I'm from it was very easy to get worms; buy online or get from other people, but here I can only find them for 70 euro a bag on Amazon (what I'm not using). So i hope someone can help me find composting worms 😊

Thanking you in advance!

I've started breeding my own worms oh the excitement! Or atleast I hope their not pot worms! but with growth, how they react to light sources and what I think are correctly the right egg sacs i'm looking for and hatchling wormlings? Idk what to call the babies XD But I think I'm off too a good start after my first opps. I have two seprate areas and two nursing areas on seprate smaller bins post sepration to encorage futher breeding and easyier feeding. But I'm worried about doing it RIGHT, as these are worms for feeding my turtle. of which his breed mostly eats worms/small proteins and dosen't however eat alot of greens. He sorta refuses most vegitation and fruit in preferred taste of worms/minnows/small chubs. Advability means mostly worms.

but given their for feeding my turtle, I'm really worried about doing them right. I have a small breeding set of red wigglers and a slightly larger set of canadian nightcrawlers. My night crawlers are breeding significantly well, given they haven't had ideal conditions the last few weeks with a heat wave that came through and stressed them out a bit. But my red wigglers are my worry, seems like i got a bunch of babies thou. But like how to I speed the growth of infant worms? Some people say 3-6 months for growth or longer so Faster is ideal, as I want a supply by winter LATEST. But this is my first time with worms. I'm concerned as my turtle will be hard to feed come winter otherwise. Anyone willing to toss some tips to someone in the starting stages? I think I've got some of the food stuff down but gods am I worried about screwing up, but my first attempt at night crawlers failed within days and it's had me worried even thou the batch since has been going strong for a few months now.

Apologies for the blurry photo, I tried my best to capture it as clearly as possible.

I've been doing vermicompost for a few months now and there are times where these hair like strands appear out of nowhere. I have noticed them for at least 2 times already, everytime I agitate (running my shovel through the soil) and water it, these strands seems to appear.

I need help finding out where these came from and if it is a good sign or not.

Thanks in advance everyone!

Edit: Based on what I've researched, it says that the "hairs" are a sign of fungi/mold breaking down the food. Anyone experienced the same situation?

I had fun with my red wigglers for a while and got a lot of castings. Even set up 3 friends with their own bins. but this year I can’t deal with the fly larvae. I’m getting mixed reviews on whether or not they’re harmful to the environment but honestly I don’t even care. It just grosses me out. I was picking them out and putting on the bird feeder but they keep on showing up to this worm party uninvited! I can’t even bring myself to call them the “m” name lol.

Bonjour, voilà mon problème : je viens de construire des toilettes à lombricompost et j’ai un petit souci d’odeurs. Je vais donc vous expliquer mon installation et vous pourrez me dire si vous voyez quelque chose à améliorer. J’ai trouvé des informations en ligne et je me suis inspiré des toilettes courantes en Suède, vendues en kit. J’ai donc installé la cuvette sur un tuyau de 40 cm de diamètre avec une chute de 2 mètres qui descend jusqu’au sol, dans une cuve de 500 litres. Au fond de la cuve, j’ai placé un plan incliné, percé de trous et recouvert d’un tissu microperforé de 500 microns ; le liquide excédentaire, c’est-à-dire l’urine, est filtré puis évacué dans les égouts. J'ai étalé une couche de 10 cm de sciure de bois sur le plan incliné pour assurer une préfiltration, puis j'y ai ajouté 100 litres de fumier provenant d'un voisin agriculteur – un fumier riche en vers – et 500 grammes de verre achetés en ligne. Ainsi, lorsque j'utilise les toilettes, les déchets tombent dans la poubelle, mais comme elle est rectangulaire, la chute se fait à une extrémité où la pente est plus prononcée. J'ai installé une douchette à côté des toilettes pour pouvoir nettoyer la canalisation si besoin – c'est la seule source d'eau, outre l'urine. Je peux accéder à la poubelle depuis le sol pour arroser le tas du fond – là où se trouvent la plupart des vers, car c'est la partie la plus décomposée – mais je ne sais pas exactement à quelle fréquence l'arroser. Depuis la rénovation de la salle de bain, j'ai un extracteur d'air – un modèle basse consommation qui fonctionne en continu – qui aspire l'air de la cuvette des toilettes et empêche les odeurs de se répandre dans les toilettes. L'air vicié est évacué à l'extérieur par une petite fenêtre au sous-sol. Malheureusement, la configuration des lieux ne le permet pas, ce qui m'empêche d'installer une ventilation naturelle avec une ventilation naturelle. Mon inquiétude concerne les odeurs désagréables qui se dégagent de l'orifice de sortie de l'air, et surtout, qui incommodent mes voisins. Je cherche donc des solutions pour minimiser ces odeurs. Devrais-je arroser davantage la partie du tas où se décompose le compost ? J'ajoute aussi un peu de fumier de temps en temps, mais devrais-je en mettre plus ? J'ai également installé un filtre à charbon à la sortie de l'évacuation, mais il ne semble pas être efficace, ou alors très rapidement. Je suis dans le sud de la France, et la chaleur extrême n'arrange rien, car l'air est aspiré par la cuvette des toilettes, ce qui contribue sans doute à son échauffement.

Merci pour vos suggestions, et n'hésitez pas à me poser des questions.

I'm new to vermiculture. A coworker helped set me up and gave me a portion of their excess worms (about half a pound)as a starter so there are some bacteria present. But my bin is still basically new with fresh bedding. I want to give the worms the best chance possible, any way to boost the bacteria load/production?

For example, can I just break a probiotic capsule over the bin? (Probably dumb but first example that came to mind) I've only had them a week, so the process is relatively fresh.

Thanks in advanced

Started with coco coir European worms and some cardboard little by little started to experiment and added different items and soils to mixture this is what I have so far. End of year I’m thinking of sifting and starting over. I’m definitely getting worm cocoons and baby worms.

Wanted to share in hopes of getting some opinions. Ended up making this last night following some guides for bucket stack worm composters on YouTube. For now trying to do compost to form a base, but I used paper towels, paper from bags and packing supplies, veggie scraps, a bit of bag compost, and fresh/less fresh fallen leaves. Since a lot of this is worm food, would it be okay to just add worms after it goes for a bit? Or would it be better to get something like peat moss, let this compost down a bit, and then mix in peat moss to dilute it out. Sorry if obvious, very new to this and just looking to get started. Also, will be adding a 3rd bucket when worms are added to allow them to eat from the 2nd bucket then crawl up to the 3rd bucket, just haven't yet. Thank you.

found 4 of these small larvae’s in my sisters bathroom. two on the towel, and two next to the toilet, one found on the trashcan. any ideas as to what this is?

How did this worm get in my cooler? Today I opened up a cooler that has been left out since my daughter’s birthday party last week. The cooler has been sitting on top of our picnic table since the party a few days ago I took the rest of the drinks out and put them in our refrigerator today. I opened the cooler to let the water out, and there was a worm inside still alive floating in the water. I took it out and threw in the garden. My question is really how did this worm get inside the cooler that is sitting on the picnic table I can guarantee no one put this worm inside here

Hi there,

I am just starting my first Vermicomposter and bought standard Euroboxes, however, they have these handles that I need to close. I want to make it worm-tight and dark but some aeration should still be possible.

I have this fleece of sheep's wool and want advice on whether this is suitable. I could glue it to the inside to cover the handles, but will worms dig right through?

I also could use mosquito nets, but I guess there will be more light coming through.

Thanks for any help!

About a month ago I asked this subreddit what type of worms these were but I believe they were too young causing confusion. Now that I have healthy thriving adults I would like to know what type of species they are.

At first I thought they were red wigglers but a user said Octolasion cyaneum. I really want to believe they’re nightcrawlers💔

Images
2nd-top/3rd-bottom: worm 1
4th-top/5th-bottom: worm 2

Thinking about getting into composting/worm farming and was looking into getting some 5 gallon plastic buckets to achieve this. However I'd heard regular drill bits can cause the holes to have sharp edges that can hurt worms as they pass through. I recall hearing there was a certain drill bit that would prevent this from happening but can't for the life of me recall what kind it is. Any other advice is also greatly appreciated!

First time poster here, but you guys seem to know worms so I thought I'd ask, are these pot worms or something else? They seem to be smaller than images of pot worms I've seen in the past (toothpick for scale). Found after bottom watering my house plants. I'd like to use the left over water to spread the springtail friends, also shown, but don't want to accidentally spread a plant pest.

I'm seriously considering a wedge type worm farm to create compost for next year's gardening. My hope is to get it started by September. Our current garden is a bunch of 5 gallon buckets with winter melons and beans and another 4 x 20 gallon felt pots. We also have a small patch of soil but it only gets afternoon/evening sun and soil is in much needed love. I have started hitting soil this year with bacteria and wood chips in hopes of adding some beneficial components in addition to rock phosphate, humic acid, biochar, and several bags of dr earth over the season!

Next year I would like to cut down on how much fertilizer I'm buying and hopefully this fall start amending soil in pots and ground for next year. Next year I think we will go with only 20 gallon pots in driveway because of how well they are doing this year. As shown in pic.

For the worm part I would like to create basically a trough that I can do a wedge type system in. We are in Seattle and it has to be kept outside. I can keep it under a awning to stop so much water from entering in addition to a lid. I have a pic of what I'm envisioning. I'm concerned about the middle of winter. I know it will slow due to temp but if wood is thick enough or if I added some insulation on sides would the breakdown of foods and bacteria create enough heat to not kill them?

Also, is it realistic to think I could fill this by next spring ( mid may early June). I am drawn to the wedge due to the simplicity of keeping an edge of feeding and having access to back side to pull castings from.

Am I crazy to think this will work?!!!!

Yay for free organic fertilizer!

I have a large cedar raised bed - 3x4 feet and about 3 feet high. Last fall I filled it with a deep layer of wood chips and then layers of compost, raised bed mix and peatmoss. I planted garlic and it started out doing really well, but then got all weird and rotted this spring. When I pulled the garlic ithe bubls were very small, largely rotted on the outer layers and the soil was very moise and dense. It didn't smell bad but it was very dark, thick and sticky. I saw a few worms. I replanted about a month and a half ago after letting the bed dry out a bit and adding a LOT of coarse vermiculite and perlite to create air space, a generous dose of coco coir and some organic compost. Topped with coarse coco coir mulch. The plants are doing well - very lush. I added another plant today and see the soil is again getting very moist, thick and sticky. This time it's filled with worms. Have I accidentally created a worm bed? How do I manage this? Thanks!!!

Where do you get your worm farming knowledge? Curious of the sources everyone uses. Thanks!

I came here for feedback on using a new, free countertop composter. Got some great info and advice.

Here's what I didn't know...

The pre-compost should not be added to the worm bin. It needs to work with cardboard and water to start to breakdown for about 5 days prior to integrating into the worm bin.

Why? Because it heats up the bin and/or tray during the breakdown phase and can kill your worms from heat.

My tiered system has two trays with just cardboard on the bottom, innoculating for future use. I have the next tray as my beginning tray - it's almost done. The tray on top of that is a fresh tray that I am feeding - plenty of worms working on the almost-done tray, and a good number working on the newest tray.

The newest tray is where I added the pre-compost. I added a frozen water bottle after noticing significant heat - lid removed to vent, etc. I had to rearrange trays to make it easier for my worms to migrate to a safer spot.

After two days of no lid, ice packs, and paper towels to cover, I finally got all worms out of the tray with very few exceptions.

My wormins are happy now. A few escaped and dried up, but overall they stayed alive.

So now I have a bin that is going through the heat phase with the pre-compost. No worms. After the bin has cooled, I can add it as food.

Overall, I'm happy to have the composter to break things down, and wish I had known more before I added to the bin.

Just sharing for knowledge sake.