How to reset the 55 gallon worm bin wedge system
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 12 ก.ย. 2024
- / @plantobsessed Worm Farm Compost Bin- Evaluation is success to my 55 gallon bin
/ @plantobsessed
This bin was made from cutting a 55 gallon food grade barrel in half long ways and screwing the open ends together to make a 6 foot long bin.
To see the previous video click here • 55 Gallon Compost Worm...
The bin lives in the cellar of my 200-year-old house. In the winter the furnace dries it out, and in the wet season the moisture leaching through the bricks makes the basement very humid. The current set up was started near the first of the year 2021 after the wormpocolypse. A rat was in the basement and all the bins had to be moved to totes and buckets with lids on to protect them. When the rat was ended, I added 4 or more of the in-progress bins/ buckets with the compost mix of red, blue and European nightcrawlers in them to fill the big blue bin. I continued to add ground leaves and food. Currently the bin is undergoing a refresh. I am harvesting the castings as the top of the bin dries and adding new bedding and food. Keeping the moisture even in the bin is difficult in the wet summer. I flip or fluff the bin to keep the air in the bedding. Back to the wedge method starting now.
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I am an Amazon affiliate. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. The items below are the Amazon affiliate links for the items I use in my wormery. I have read and recommend these books. The cost is the same to you, but the channel will be supported and get a small commission if purchases are made using the links.
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Tetra 16172 Aqua Safe Fish Tank Water Conditioner
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Worm Farmers Handbook Book
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So appreciate the further education. I've been warm farming for a few years now but still learn something from every video I watch. And you've become my favorite warm mentor!
Thank you for the kind words 😊🪱👍🏼
I would have never thought I'd be running my bare hands through the eauey gooey rotten foodstuffs yet here I am doing it after watching your videos for a few months. So satisfying! I am only just getting started but now I need a big blue like yours!
You totally need a blue. 💙
Thanks for the thorough description of your castings storage and wedge method, Ann. I bet Blue’s worms will attack that cardboard divider if you leave them too long without nourishment! They are like the plant in Little Shop of Horrors: “Feed me!”
~ Sandra
I hope to keep it there until next time. As I have said worms do what they want 😅
"Basically the whole bin is a worm ball" I love it!! I like the super sized AV partition you put in as a marker. For pineapples I slice off the leafy end leaving only what I would not eat. Then setting the fleshy side down on a flat surface, I trim the rest of the flesh off almost right up to the circumference of the leaves. Then I take a small square piece of cardboard and cut an + into it and push the bottom part of the leaves (the fleshy part I just trimmed) in to the + in the cardboard square and bury the square in the ground. Almost every pineapple I plant like this survives. So short story long I guess I would throw that leafy part in with almost all the flesh cut away into the worm bin...but if the leaves are buried I bet it doesn't have a chance against the worms!! Wow, sorry I wasted your time with that long comment🤣😂🤣Excellent video!! I enjoyed learning about your overs collection!!🪱🪱🪱
Not wasted time I had a feeling you would have experience with the pineapples thank you for taking the time to explain it. 😊
Yay - worm bin partitions are awesome 👍🏻 keep those castings nice & clean :)
Like you, I've got a collection of all the big tough stuff that I screened out of the materials I brought indoors over the winter from my harvested compost barrel. Its at least a couple gallons of things such as peach, plum & cherry pits, peanut & pistachio shells, sticks, etc., etc. I too have considered doing something similar to what you have going on - basically making the stuff all very, very damp... and then leaving it for an extended period of time. Even better would be the inclusion of bedding & worms to give the stuff a chance at some day actually breaking down. I don't recall much mention here on your channel of your 'overs' collections. Now I have a reason to take yet another idea from your playbook & finally establish some sort of game plan for that stuff after having it sit around idle for the past 8 months & counting..... The real question now is whether or not I will actually do something with it - or will it just continue to sit idle
If I was you I would put the overs in the outside compost bin. If I was me...and I am... so I would find the hardest way of doing it and then do that. 🤪
I think for growing a pineapple you need to twist off the top leaves, remove some of the bottom leaves and then put them in water over weeks, so it can grow roots. Saw a video on TH-cam, maybe you can find it. I tried it but it didn't work. Depends how far along your pineapple is already, too.
I'd love to have a Big Blue for myself! Love your methodical way of work farming and learn something every time I watch one of your videos!
It was super ripe. Maybe it was too late. Thank you for the kind words.
My bins were 4x4x3 I harvested castings the same way you are. I'm really enjoying your channel. And learning a lot. Even though I've been worm farming for 10 plus years. Thanks
Thank you. I generally learn the hard way so I hope I make mistakes and others can learn by it. Thank you for the kind words.
Greetings Ann, from Windermere, Florida zone 9b USA 🇺🇸
I'm mesmerized watching you sift and massage the worms 🪱 and Castings, Mom 💓🪱💓
BTW, Beautiful Castings 👍🪱👍
Thank you 😊
I believe with the worm chow it gets damp and the flour turns into glue. Papier-mâché style. If it's more mixed in the tiny flour particles aren't touching each other so much and also don't dry as readily.
OMG I'm making paper macche for real!! Strips paper and flour.
No kidding my Vermi Totes are about topped off! haha, uh oh. Like I told AJ long ago that's where the real work is. I bought those green gold pan things you have. I'm an institutionalized 'working stiff' now. LOL Every party needs a pooper; that's why we invited you BRIAN.
Is Brian like a male Karen? Lol
Hi, Ann. Pineapples are rather easy to grow. Just stick the crown in the ground or in a pot. I’ve never tried having my worms help with growing them. Some people put the crown into a glass of water and wait for roots to appear. Also, you can peel off the lower leaves and you’ll notice some knobby bits which are the roots and then plant them. I look forward to you and blue growing a pineapple. Who knows he’ll grow you a tropical paradise if you’re lucky 😊. Thanks for sharing.
Good tips thank you. I have added papaya and pomegranate trees this year. Thank you for being a part of my worms family for 7 months.
@@PlantObsessed I love my worm people.
You can mix food with the bedding because your bin is large enough to still maintain plenty of aeration, but for most people who aren't working with 55gal of volume and what looks like at least 8 sq ft of surface area, they shouldn't do what you're doing... Most worm farmers should dig a hole in one corner, fill it with food and usually cover it up to keep the flies out (fly larvae are fine for composting but can cause a pest problems humans don't like). This way the decomposing food doesn't rob all the oxygen near the surface of the bin which worms need to survive. It's only when you have plenty of surface area relative to the amount of decomposing food that you can mix food into the bedding and not have to worry about O2 levels.
Yes I say that all the time with my small bins. Feed at one end so the worms can get away if they need to. The same still applies with blue.
I'm thinking about turning an old plastic bin that I used to use for storage but don't need anymore into a worm bin for wedge method. My worms currently live in a five-gallon bucket, and i thought at first, I'd only put half of them in the new bin, at least until I'm sure the system is working well for me. It's a shallow, clear bin, so I thought I would spray the outside with dark spray paint except for the "harvest zone" at one end, so the worms would be motivated to migrate not only toward food and fresh bedding at the opposite end, but away from the light coming through the part where the plastic is left clear. If it works well, then once it's really going, I'm hoping I could harvest a few handfuls of fairly worm-free castings any time I need them for container gardening.
I use very shallow totes for my red wigglers. I didn't even paint them black and they work great 👍
@@PlantObsessed Good to know!
As far as rooting a pineapple damp sand and root tone is what we did in Hawaii you will need to pot in rich soil once it roots. There probably is a video guide out there lol.
Lol good point somebody has a channel for that. You know I need another tropical plant.
I missed the post for ingredients for worm chow
There will be a video today. The ingredients will be listed there as well.
Wow, I like the leftover bins. It will be interesting to see how many worms are in there and the casting they made. Did you can some tomatoes or make sauce?
Yes, I am up to 3 batches of salsa and 1 batch of spaghetti sauce. Tomorrow more salsa I think.
@@PlantObsessed awesome! I just picked up a pressure canner. Hoping to do some tomato sauce, pickles and maybe some stew or meat 😁😋
My goodness, that wedge method looks very successful. You have more worms in your 55gal barrel then I've ever seen before. Will you be dividing them into another bin soon?
No dividing. I just gave them more room. When I give away worms or start a new project, I take them from this bin.
Where you live are Soldier Fly larvae an issue? My outdoor bin has some in there and I’m not too worried cause it’s not many at all. But yours are in your basement so I wondered if you ever had them pop up in your bins.
I have only seen them when I bring outside bins inside. They don't seem to come in on their own on the leaves.
Have you ever tried to give your compost worms a lot of leafes? We're heading straight to fall and i as a gardener am already thinking how to get as much compost as possible for next year...
Yes, I have used up all of last year's leaves. In a month I'll have a ton again.
No grass skirts ??
Not this time
For me as a beginner I’m harvesting castings for the first time, l just started on May 15, the castings are full of tiny new worms that go thru the 18 inch screen, what do I do to help them?
1/8 inch
I will give the cast a few weeks to let the wisps grow up big enough to catch them without hurting them. Good luck. 🪱😁👍🏼
Thanks , will wait
I was wondering do you keep a light on in your wormery along with covering to keep them from getting out , since you don't cover with a lid on big blue?
Lights are usually off but now that there are plants there are lights on part of the time.
My bin or worm farm is very wet how do I remove some of the moisture
You can add more dry shredded carddboard or Coco coir. If not available you can use a piece of cardboard stuffed down the side to wick away the moisture.
Thank you I made a hole in the one front corner to the bottom of the container and filled and pressed it down with cardboard shreadings also put wedge at the rear of the container so all waters at bottom run down to the front and its working thank you
Hi ann, as a newbie in this do i need to sift castings or is it fine to not to?
You do not need to sift. I use my castings for my bonsai so I sift to keep it tidy.
I have just started a red wriggler bin farm in a 17 gal tote, it is tall with a lid and I have added several air holes along the top. The little stinkers try escaping every night. I find them hanging out on the top inside rim under the edge of the lid. I don’t know why they want to wiggle away, too wet to dry?? Bought a moisture meter and it eels to stay on the line between dry and moist. The bedding is coco, shredded newspaper and egg shell cartons. I can not form a ball of “dirt” like you did, mine just falls apart, I think it needs for water?? Any idea?
Might need more water. I would leave the lid off and put a light over them. It seems wrong but the lids male them crawl on the walls due to increasing moisture on the walls.
@@PlantObsessed thank you so much for the wonderful advice. I wipe the moisture of the walls before bedtime and no more wall climbing for the little stinkers….