oh man that stinks.Best of luck!

I have a hard enough time with the robins hunting in my vegetable garden... I'd be horrified if they got my wigglers.

I'm sorry to hear of your loss. Hopefully you have lots of smart worms that hid themselves deep and cocoons and will be back in business before long.

Thanks, I didn't lose that much, and I don't think I have been that successful with my flow thru, so I am OK with it. I did better with bins.

Blech. Worm drama. :D

So sorry!

I am so glad my flow through is in the basement.

I just can't seem to stop checking the bin. I want to add more food. :) I am more harmful than any other animal.

Karen

Karen -- such restraint. Go ahead and give in. Feed the worms ;-)

Keith

Flow Through Collapse sounded like a good thing at first. I thought your vermicompost or vermicastings had self harvested into the collection area. I'm guessing it was a structual engineering problem. Maybe the access area was larger than the rest of the bin could support around? 100 gallons of water weighs 835 pounds. I can see it now. At first like the leaning tower of pisa. What does the bin look like now? How wide was the opening? Sucess is usually built upon a firm foundation of failures. The good things: Nobody got hurt. The back porch did not collapse from the weight. The birds had a bonanza to support baby chicks. You got a good look at what was really happening throughout the flow thru. and You know you have a great husband!

Any details of how and why it collapsed?

Sorry about your flow-thru. I checked out the photos on the other site (great looking garden, by the way) and I think those wheelie garbage cans are just too thin a material to support the weight of VC. Your bin was set up just like all the rest I have seen on the net so I donÂt think the construction was off. I just think the material on the sides is too thin. My buddy has one like that and his did an accordion act below his wires.

Karen -- such restraint. Go ahead and give in. Feed the worms ;-)

Keith

It would help to not cut the emtire front out, leave a couple of inches either side of the access hole.

I gave in and fed them a stale beer and cardboard. I also gave 2 cantelope rinds.

Karen

equinoxequinox, It actually was predicated by massive amounts of VC fall in the days before the collapse. I got a large bin full, maybe 15 gallons? So that was good. I had put it in a smaller bin to hatch out some cocoons, so there was at least that much less weight in the bin.
I think as the weather got warmer, the plastic in the bin got weaker. I also had taken out some of the bars (you all said I would!) to make VC collection easier. I had a block of ice on top of the bin that day to cool it off, and the bag it was in punctured, making a rivulet down one side. That unbalanced the weight, I think, and that one side folded in just below the bars.
There was some plastic left around the collection area, and a small log in the center as a support, but it just wasn't enough as the bin got fuller.
If I resurrect it, I will have to be careful not to get it anywhere near full, and to let Dear Hubby reinforce it more. And to be very careful to keep it more damp inside. Parts of it were quite dry.

Karen, I am glad you fed your worms, did they enjoy the feast? Did you enjoy it too??

Here is a link that might be useful:

Steamyb,
Thanks for the comment on my garden! This is my first one ever, besides the random tomato plant in a pot. Thank goodness for youtube.

I am jealous of your garden. All I can grow is OLD. LOL
But, that beats the alternative.

So glad you posted what you learned.

I did love feeding them. They got some processed veggies, cardboard (lots) and a couple cantelope rinds.

My kids love cantelope so I have more in bags in the freezer.

Karen

Where did you get the instructions to build your flow-through? Or did you just sort of wing it? I would love to have one but the ones that you can purchase are SO expensive!

Wendrew8 -- send me an e-mail and I can send you how I built mine for $10 -$20.

Wendrew,
I searched at
http://vermicomposters.ning.com

for photos and different ways to build them. Then I pretty much copied them, but using what I had on hand, or for cheap. Looks like I went too cheap with the bin, eh?

"Looks like I went too cheap with the bin, eh?" No. The design parameters for a trash tote and for a mega pound vermicompost tote are two different things. So to expect that cutting away part of the structual integrity of one in order to have the other which has more stresses upon it is asking a bit much of thin plastic. Paying for a better trash tote and weaking the structual integrity would not of secured a better vermicompost tote. I did like the wood support. It was along the right idea. But it blocked the whole vermicompost easy harvest thing.

Wendrew8

I just read here and winged it...

Mine is an old kitchen trash can with a hole in the bottom side. I then added some plastic garden stakes above the hole. Next, news paper to keep the material in the bottom from falling through.

Next, I took a container that I had aging for 2 weeks
(this had paper, soil, leaves, kitchen waste etc) and dumped it alternating with cardboard pieces, egg carton or shredded paper.

I am not an expert but I think I did well. I have had my worms in it for 2-3 weeks now. So far, they are doing well and even breeding.

I did finally add more food recently to one side. I also shoved cantelope rinds down the sides of the bin (2-3 of them) I had a yucky beer my hubby hates so I also dumped that on some of the cardboard recently for moisture. It was looking a little dry.

I always cover with a damp piece of cardboard then my lid which is not airtight.

I wish I had taken pics of the process. it was very easy to do!

Karen

I have found my kitty litter bins to be amazingly strong. I think it is the fairly narrow dimensions compared to the thickness of the plastic. Plus I did not cut too much-only the minimum window I could get away with.

Sorry to hear about the collapse. I was enjoying the posts about the build and fill and looking forward to the harvests. Kitty litter bins and 5 gallon pails are designed to be filled with heavy stuff and stacked with their covers on. They have a great future for flow thru designs that require cutting the plastic. Rubbermade bins are designed to be filled with medium weight stuff and stacked. Trash cans are not designed to withstand heavy stuff, think water, cement, or stacking. Blue water barrel$$ might give size and strength.