Let There Be Light! Light Migration in Big Boy Worm Tote
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 4 ต.ค. 2024
- Hello!
Using the bait stations in Big Boy to remove worms out of castings worked well 👍🪱.
However, some very experienced worm wranglers suggested using the light migration method instead 👍. I am eager to give this a try and see if it works better/easier for me.
Come see how I’ve set this up to work and the challenges I had to address to do so.
If you're interested in awesome red wigglers, cocoons, castings and worm foods to start you worm adventure or enhance your gardening results, please go to my website:
rockinworms.com
Thanks!
Jayne
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I learn something every time I see your videos! Thank you.
Hi! Thanks - that’s a great compliment 🤗. ❤️🪱🪱
Thanks Jayne and camera man . I don’t have the patience for this type of harvesting. However I have used this method to harvest wet castings on a table. I made several long wind rows six inches wide x four inches high. It was much easier than trying to screen wet castings 😎
‘You can’t sift mud’ is one of Cameraman’s favorite sayings.
I did find making mini towers did help the scooping along much better. I still like the baiting trays and horizontal migration best!!
👍🪱🪱. Thanks for watching 🤗
Before I started using downward migration as my primary way to separate castings, I did light migration a few times. One thing that made it a bit quicker is I used a small dust pan and stiff bristle paint brush to sweep the castings into the dust pan, did not pick up as many worms that way.
Enjoy your videos!
Stay Well!!! Happy New Year!😊
Hi Brian! You know, I’ve done exactly that in the last few times I did light separating and it does work great. I use my paint brush all the time too! And I never ever thought to use it doing this light separating 😬🙄😞. Ah well! I’d say next time but am hoping there won’t be a next time! 😂😂
Thanks for reminding everyone that using a brush is a really good idea 👍🪱🪱
Guess I completely missed this one or didn't get back for comment.
We always use what we have to work with at the time, but it didn't take me long to figure out anything with a depth over 10 or 12 inches started to work against me and provided no real benefit for the worms or the process. I found keeping the bedding level throughout the harvesting surface working back and forth seemed to work the best. Out of all the ways to separate worms from castings we all end up in the same place. There really isn't a good or best way of doing this, but I think it's the best use of one's time. Over the last few years, the worms have taught me how to better work with them instead of doing too much when it's not needed- less is usually always better when you figure this out. I also found when using the light method that if you agitate the top few inches they would move down quicker. Just loosen up the castings so the light can penetrate, and things move faster as they don't like to be disturbed. Lol
Hi VermiCast! The bedding depth wasn’t more than 10” inches in Big Boy. The issue was the sides of the tote itself was closer to 18-20”. I did agitate the surface while it was flat but perhaps because the worms were small they didn’t move down very much even with the agitation. Grr. That’s when I went to the more typical mounding shape of the bedding/castings - that did work better. I also think if the worms were bigger it all would have worked easier.
I had a few regular bins of bigger worms that were quite wet (2 of the slow down bins) and the light method worked really well on them. I was able to gather all the worms and refresh the entire bin bedding in one go which was great 👍.
Thanks for swinging by!👍🪱❤️
Light harvesting can be helpful to sort out castings.nice looking castings 🇳🇿
Hello! Yes it can! I just don’t like doing it 😂😂😂.
The castings are really nice! I’ve collected about 18 gallons so far!😎🪱🪱
Hi Jayne, Just wanted to say thank you for all the interesting and engaging content that you share.
And to wish you and yours a Happy New Year 😊 Have fun, Mark : )
Hi Mark! Thank you! Happy new year to you too! And thank you for the kind words as well 🤗
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That's quite a bright light, Jayne! I use just the ambient light in my house to skim off castings if I need some for a plant or something. I just remove all the worm blankets or paper and, after 10 minutes or so, I get enough for my needs. But, as you say, it's not my preferred method for a big harvest. Happy New Year 🥳 🎉
~ Sandra
Hi Sandra! I do so much of my worm work at night. Ambient light is hard to come by then 🤣. This light is bright but doesn’t give off any heat so it works well for this job.
I did find that humping the castings up into a mini tower and scooping castings off the sides worked better than skimming castings off the flat surface. But yeah, still not a big fan! 🤣🤣😎
I'm sorry new to the worm farming here. Is this supposed to be better than sifting and putting the worms in another bin? Thanks for all your great videos!
Hello! Welcome! Don’t be sorry 😊. There’s a lot to learn and experiment with to find what works best for you 👍😎.
It’s not a case of one method intrinsically being better than another. It’s using the best method that works for the situation. It’s really helpful to know the several different ways to separate worms from castings from cocoons.
The light method is used when you want to remove castings from castings/bedding but not disturb the worms too much. It’s also the method many worm wranglers use when dealing with young worms as they’re very small and would fall thru the sifter mesh.
Sifting the worms out works great when the worms are a good size and are caught by the 1/8” screen sifter. The castings fall thru and the worm stay in the sifter.
Horizontal migration and downward migration are also great methods to use.
I’m honestly not a fan of the light method but sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do 🙄.
The horizontal migration and baited tray methods I also used for this big tote worked great too and frankly I prefer them. *I* prefer them. You may not. Bill and Ted might prefer light migration. The point isn’t have many tools to use and see what you like and what works best for you. Keep learning! That’s the real tip! 👍🪱❤️
Hi Jayne. Hope I got the spelling right. I'm new to worm farming. Just one month into it, so I haven't reached this stage yet. But I'm just wondering if sifting is not better and quicker. Thanks again for sharing. Really enjoy your videos. Very useful and informative.
Hi! Yes that how my name is spelled: Jayne. But I’ll answer to anything, especially if there’s chocolate involved 🤣🤣🤣.
Someone else asked a similar question. The answer, for me, is that it depends on a couple of factors. Are the castings dry enough to sift? And how big are the worms. If the castings are too moist to sift, well then you can’t sift! Options like horizontal and downward migration will be more efficient. If the castings are siftable (is that a word?!) then that’s great! But are the worms big enough to be caught in a screen and still let the castings fall thru?? If the worms are small then maybe sifting isn’t the right tool to use.
But if it’s a wonderful day and the castings are drier and the worms are decent sized then sifting is a very good way to go.
The whole reason there’s several methods for removing worms from castings is because worm wranglers NEED several methods to fit the exact conditions they are facing at the time they want to do the separation. One size does not fit all situations. Ok?
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Ok, thanks. Makes absolute sense now that you put it into context. Great job.
@RockinWorms hi, before I started worm farming, I put out a question asking this - if I farm worms they will be outside, under shelter but outside. I assume the worms will die, am I right in my belief that the cocoons will survive and over winter hatching in the warmer spring?
I had 2answers one from a lady on ytube who said " no, both worms and cocoons will die" ! The other from a worm seller who said "don't know". The second answer I thought was an honest answer, he just couldn't say. The lady I think was guessing! After all how do the worms survive in the wild if their cocoons die? To me nature wanting survival would have some sort of anti freeze going on with the cocoons. Later Jane an I had a similar conversation re how cocoons, eggs, pupae survive low temps. The reason I mention this - I had a seller contact me the other week from Yorkshire which is north of me, so gets harsher weather. He said he has indoor and outdoor worm farms.he told me that the worms go dormant until it gets warmer, if they do die, the cocoons start to hatch in spring. He told me he sold a package that contained worms and cocoons if I needed to replenish. I knew I wouldn't be able to harvest my castings in time for my seed planting. because I only have space outside to harvest, I have no where indoors to do it. So I ordered some of his castings, my thoughts? Maybe, just maybe, there will be some cocoons in the castings. I ordered 3.5kg of castings, which arrived yesterday. I sorted through a little short of half of the castings, before my back pained so much I had to stop. My prize? 2worms and 6cocoons. One worm was long and thin the other was short and a little fatter. Both, played dead when I found them but a little while after I placed them in a tray they started moving around, exploring. Of the 6cocoons? 2 were large, 2 very small (I nearly missed them) the last 2were between the large and very small in size. I expect there are more in the sack, but I had to stop and I had to put the castings back in the sack. Anyway, I think 2worms (who are teenagers😂) and the cocoons will give me a reasonable start, hopefully in the spring. I'm a novice here but the moistness of the castings and the weather we have been having recently makes me think these castings are from his indoor farm. Take care 💕
Hey Taya! Happy new year!
You’re right - Mother Nature wants her species to survive generally speaking. The type of worm it is does affect the amount of ‘anti freeze’ in the cocoons. Esenias (red wigglers and euros) have good amounts of the substances that will allow the baby worms inside to survive until more favorable conditions arrive. Cocoons laid on the surface may not survive or the rate will be lower than cocoons buried in leaf litter, soil, etc that provides additional protection. Some of the adults and juveniles will also survive if they get below the frost line. A worm wrangler I respect very much says the some adults can freeze and then defrost and be ok if the freeze time is short. I had a bit of that happen with a worm shipment to a very cold area. 6% of the adults survived. The rest had areas on their bodies that looked like bursting had occurred 😢. My guess is that the survivors were in the middle of a worm ball and got the extra heat/insulation from that. The replacement cocoons I shipped as well as cocoons for a different person survived very well with some careful packaging to help the insulation factor.
You can search thru the castings you received a bit at a time. Or wait a month and bait cup any hatchlings out. It depends on your timing for seed planting.
Regardless you do have some worms and cocoons to begin with and given solid care they will multiply fast! 👍😎🪱
@@RockinWorms hi, oops sorry happy new year 🤭. I have them in one of the micro dinner for 2 container, they are sat with the box of frass on the side board. There was debris in the castings which I guess was whatever he fed them and some coir so I used some of the castings for them to go in. I did put a little dry food through the castings-now bedding for the hungry 2. I have the sack in the poly sack it came in (which Is disintegrating) in my kitchen, so if more worms are in there they will get warm. Yes, I'll leave them a few days and then search through again. He suggested he had rw's but they may be mixed reds. Doesn't matter really, I just prefer rw's. Take care 💕
@@tayag9223 🤞you find more over the next few weeks 😍
@@RockinWorms hi, I searched through castings again. Again I only manage about half way through. This time I found 23 cocoons, a strange thing happened, one cocoon suddenly popped, no worms just fluid 😕. So now I have 28cocoons and the 2worms, who have disappeared into the tub, I didn't disturb them, some of the casting had grown white hairy mould just by the edge of moist paper i placed over them. I'll do some more sorting in a few days. Take care 💕
@@tayag9223 Hey. I haven’t heard of empty cocoons but it doesn’t surprise me. There are procreation misfires all the time. Why would worms be any different.
I’m more curious about fuzzy mold on castings. I’ve not heard of that either. Mold on castings. 🤷♂️.
Food yes, coffee grounds yes. Pre-compost definitely. But on castings? Are you sure it was on castings? 🧐
❤ Love the size of Big Boy
Wondering if putting him on one or 2 of those moving trolleys from Harbor Freight so he's able to hide under the table when not in use and raises him up a few inches so sitting in a chair for Worm Chores like fluffing, feeding and sifting would work for you, I've done that with my 2 indoor worm bins that are working on revitalizing my old potting soils mixed with shredded paper and boxes plus food scraps 🪱 how many worms are in the bin & how long did it take to get to harvesting?🪱
Hello! Hmmm… I’ll look into that - good idea! The table itself is European and is higher and has a very deep apron so raises Big Boy more than a standard table does. It’s ok for regular bins or Orange Julius but did cause issues with the tall sided tote. I didn’t think about that ahead of moving him there 🙄.
I have a few shorts coming up that give updates on Big Boy and the young worms 👍.
It about a month from when Big Boy got Orange Julius’ worms to when I started baiting them out. But the harvest could have started several weeks earlier as far as the castings being ready. The bedding was mostly castings to begin with. This whole process started with cocoons out of several breeder bins that were already in mostly castings from those breeder bins. I didn’t add fresh bedding except in the feed zones after the babies hatched and I started feeding them ‘real food’.
I find it a challenge/difficult/a real pain in the butt to harvest very young worms out of castings. I was hoping the light method would make this task easier/faster/more agreeable for me. It didn’t 🥲. I still don’t like it. So I’m making changes to address this!
It’s hard to say how long it took to empty Big Boy and harvest as I didn’t do it straight thru or even on consecutive days. I did the majority of it over about 10 days. I actually still have a few regular bins working to collect the stragglers 😳🙄. You’ll see that in a short as well 😊. 😎❤️🪱