This is a good question... I think it kind of depends on how you are feeding your squirm of worms. I feed in pockets and sometimes a pocket will go "smelly" through lack of air. So I do "turn the mix" then. Also because I have a can o worms I find that the bottom level benefits from a good mix about three weeks before I harvest it. Mixing tends to fluff everything up and expose any last little bits and pieces that need a bix of oxygen to be processed but it does disturb the worms. But I wouldn't recommend regularly mixing the vermicompost while your worms are in there processing it as it will only discourage them.

thanks for the answer...so just fluff once in awhile i guess? i just got my worms today b/c i found a great deal, but i don't have my bin set up yet. heck, i don't even have a bin to set up! they're in a quart sized container with the lid off and window screening covering the top with a rubberband holding it in place. looked like a lot of castings so i dumped both small containers into the quart (lots of egg cases!) and gave them some old salad mix i had and put some wood shavings on top and damped it a bit. i hope that is ok for now until i get back from vacation...

I'm in my bin every few days, tossing stuff around and churning stuff up. It seems to help with those anaerobic spots in the bin, but mostly its because I'm curious about what they're doing in there and whether they're slacking off. It doesn't seem to bother them.

I agree I am brutal with my bins and they seem happy.

thanks that's good to hear...i'll probably be digging b/c i'm curious too :)

Another one who is brutal and churns the squirm every couple of days. I just am curious and want to see what is going on in there.

This is a good topic! I can't seem to leave my three rubbermaid bins alone because of curiosity. However, I recently moved one outside, leaving it alone to enjoy our warm weather for a few days.

When cold temperatures returned I brought it back in and started digging around again. Low and behold, I found many more cocoons than are in my other bins. I'm thinking there may be a significant correlation between degree of churning and reproduction rates. Any thoughts?

I used to dig in my bin quite often(nightly) now I usually only dig in it once a week. I think the worms are happier now that I don't dig as often:)

Cass:)

The third graders at my school have a rubbermaid bin, and yes, they do get turned over 5 days a week, as you can imagine. LOL!

As for my own bin, I gently go down to the bottom with a trowel and lift up a time or two each week. I think it helps to aerate and keep thing from getting too packed down.

I think its a good idea to mix it up every 14days or so, expecially if you put a lot of leaves or grass that can get matted or dry out. I mix it a lot only during harvest, every time I take out castings, because it loosens the soil enough that the worms can easily go down while I scrape off the next top layer of castings.

A vermicomposting system is designed to allow the worms to do the turning and aerating, so specific to your question, no, a worm bin is not usually turned. As you can see, however, there are many experienced folks who feel it aids their bin to turn, and who do it regularly. There is some evidence that bins that are aggressively turned (not just looked through, but intentionally turned over like a compost pile) regularly tend to have lower reproductive and processing rates than do bins that are not turned, but not by a tremendous amount, and this is by no means a universally recognized effect.

Bottom line, worm bin management is an intuitive thing. If you feel your bin would benefit from some fluffing and turning, go for it. The worms will forgive and forget quickly. Know, however, that the majority of vermicomposters do not find that it is required.

Kelly S

But where's the fun if you don't peek, Kelly? :)

Mrs. Joe says that I actually blushed the first time I found two of my worms kinda stuck together. It took way too long before I figured out what was going on...

LOL Joe - like Kelly sez - worms forgive and forget quickly, but I can't help thinkin about all the 'couples', not to mention friends and families, I'm breakin up every time I thrash over my outdoor bin - prolly why there's a little diff in reproduction rate is they gotta form 'compatible' couples all over again! :) I do it to check the overall progess and moisture conditions, and add a couple wheelbarrows of semi-done compost from the fast/hot bins when it looks like they need more feed, and find that watering the bin works best after I 'fluff' it a bit, but my attentions are only once a month or so

Bill

I would imagine the human birth statistics nine months from the day of any great night-time earthquake would be significantly down in that region.

Google it,

Chuckiebtoo

I try not to disturb them unless things get a bit anerobic. But when I finally got to harvest my first batch... I was amazed at how many worms and eggs were still in the bottom. As I moved things around I found pockets of food still there. Maybe if I'd "fluffed" more regularly they would have been finished more... or maybe I just needed to give them more time to eat it all up and move through the screen to the fresher food before trying to harvest.

With my 4 x 32 gallon flow-thru bins, I have no need to turn the vermix. I do periodically rotate the entire bins about 45 degrees in each direction in order to cut off the bottom compost against the hardware mesh under the bins, so that it falls into my collecting receptacles. The compost tends to flow down with the weight of mix above it, and air flows up through the hardware mesh and the big holes in the bottom of the bins.

In my bins, I don't feed again until I can't recognize any previous foodstuffs. Using newspaper, I can tell when the worms start consuming it. I'v never had an anaerobic situation yet (knock, knock).

Chuckiebtoo

We do not turn or disturb our windrows. As Kelly S has stated that greatly helps the worm growth. Our neighbor has a large rake he built on his loader bucket. He runs the rake once or twice a week through the rows. (my opinion, a big mistake) Our lab tests and customers have proven to us that our castings are much better. We have had one large buyer (buys from both of us, 100 miles away) take the day off and drive up just to see and ask why are your castings so much prettier, nicer, and better. They also pay us 3 times the price (yes true).
Now we are experiementing with an Oxygen composting engineer by building large blowers system in the windrows and castings piles to speed the aerobic conditions to make an even better product.

Here is a link that might be useful: WormsWrangler.com

We do not turn or disturb our windrows. As Kelly S has stated that greatly helps the worm growth.

I'm not sure that this is what Kelly said:

There is some evidence that bins that are aggressively turned (not just looked through, but intentionally turned over like a compost pile) regularly tend to have lower reproductive and processing rates than do bins that are not turned, but not by a tremendous amount, and this is by no means a universally recognized effect.

I'm sure that there is a huge difference between those who are raising worms for a living and those who are vermicomposting on a household scale. I'm not convinced by this discussion that we small time vermicomposters will see a big difference. We're not doing windrows.

And without the fun factor, we will lose wormers. I'll continue to rummage around my bin. :)