But how does it taste??? :)

No idea. Probably like squash. ;)

I just wanted to see what would happen when I planted these guys in castings.

As expected, they grew as if they were raised on steroids.

I'm not a squash lover, but my tortoises are!

Here is a link that might be useful: The Worm Dude

I wonder what makes worm casts so magical. Perhaps a certain chemical the worms secrete?

I will hopefully be trying some worm castings in my garden soon. What i want to do is try it on tomatoes...the wife and I love tomatoes and I am quite eager to see what happens

It's the micro organisms and beneficial bacteria in the castings which makes for a perfect growth medium. Sythetic fertilizer has high NPK values, but not in a form easily absorbed by your plants.

Take a look at this article: http://www.themulch.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=152&Itemid=1

Using castings is just gardening with a bump from mother nature.

Here is a link that might be useful: The Worm Dude

That's a load of crap. Plants do not thrive in pure compost (or vermicompost, or castings). They need soil for structure.

What are you trying to sell?????

wow...to the point there garden fanatic. But good question.

Gardenfanatic,

Please tell me everything you KNOW about growing in pure castings.

I'm listening.

Here is a link that might be useful: The Worm Dude

should we get some popcorn and coke for this discussion....

Related to this is my response on the "Cool New Worm" thread.

Gardenfanatic,

I tend to be on the side of "the worm dude". I have a tomato plant that was growing poorly in a flower pot. I decided to plant the tomato into an in ground worm pit. This plant has thrived and is still growing. It has grown so fast that I couldn't keep it staked up. It is looking much like a pumpkin with runners everywhere. The heat and dry weather that we had did get the fruiting to slow down but now it's starting to flower and put an tomatoes again.

Vermiman.
The key point is you say in ground worm pit, not soilless 100% castings. CB2 has made mention of lots of worms in his raised beds. I plan on building raised beds next year and adding lots of EF's to the beds myself.

Vermiman,

Did you say your in ground worm pit contains soil?

Anyone that has raised worms knows that EVERYTHING sprouts in a worm bin, even with an absence of sunlight. Not sure about anyone else, but I do not have soil in my worm bins. Which makes me wonder why all the doubts about growing in pure castings.

I could provide pics of an entire raised bed around the perimiter of my yard that is about 18 inches deep, completely filled with castings. Everything growing inside it looks beautiful. There is no doubt when looking at this, that it is not our normal clay soil.

Well the theory is that you cannot have 100% pure castings no matter how hard you try, since part of it will always be decomposed matter, dirt, etc. Vermicompost, yes, but not vermicast.

According to your theory, I guess they should take the word Vermicast out of the dictionary.

100% of anything is rarely achieved, except maybe in a clean room.

There is no dirt in my worm byproducts. Therefore, my growing medium is soiless. It has worked great.

Okay I've tried to give you the benefit of the doubt, but it's becoming more obvious to me that you are either being contrarian for the sake of being contrarian, or you're breaking forum rules and trying to sell your product. In case you are trying to sell something, being crass and sarcastic to potential customers usually doesn't sell stuff

last winter I buried a wooden box 6' X 3' X 3' . I seeded it with aged leaves, cut grass, several pumpkins I bought for a quarter each and worms. In early spring it was thriving with worms. The bedding in that pit is about a third of what it used to be. I am pretty sure that the bedding is "soilless" and no one can guarantee 100% castings. But my pit is nowhere near the lower percentages where some have claimed plants thrive in. I believe that if this plant was raised in a (soil > castings) mixture then I would not have seen such great results. Infact I have about ten tomatoes in my garden where I added casting at planting time and also top fed with it. These plants have not nearly thrived as well as the one in the pit. All the plants were the same type and bought at the same place.

Takadi,

Worm castings are best sold locally because of the expense of shipping. You can find castings cheap all over the place. My castings are not cheap. I didn't start the thread to sell castings. I started it because I saw findings contrary to the discussions here.

I started this particuliar thread, and have been subject to nothing but crass and sarcastic comments. In fact, instead of actual debates, most of the cheap shots are done sniper sytle. How many direct questions have been answered? Not many. How many of you actually deal with what you are talking about?

If you consider me contrarian because I am challenging some of the comments made, some referencing things as silly as Wiki's....you bet I am contrarian.

Let me ask you a few valid questions:

If you read a published article, then try things for yourself that consistently show results contrary to the published article, which do you believe?

When you read two published articles with conflicting results...how do you handle this?

If everything having to do with worms has already been identified, and the forums are just rehashing old news, I guess the forums are pointless.

It is obvious that many of the readers of the forums do not feel comfortable commenting. Sadly, this is the environment that has been created. It is definitely not a healthy environment. Want PROOF...look at the number of views vs. the number of actual comments.

If you want to have a rational back and forth discussion, let's talk. You don't have to agree...no sweat, that makes for lively debate. Just don't hide behind the internet with cheap shots, and don't freak because someone doesn't automatically agree with some of the postings.

Dunno why people are getting so worked up. He's just another worm nut. Personally I'd love to have more castings for my veggies (next season should be better!). It's nice to hear that 100% castings works whether you believe it to be optimal or not.

If anything I'd tease him for treating his tortoises so well :)

I do want to say though 8-ball squash probably means you should pick them (for human consumption) when they are that sized. Squash are typically picked premature, though I have not grown that variety. Just in case I dont mean to say they arent a success

Yes many melons will keep growing to huge proportions if left to grow. They are meant to be picked and eaten at a smaller size.

Vman ''aged leaves, cut grass, several pumpkins'' That's the makings of some pretty good compost right there. I have a flow through bin filled w/ cut grass, corrugated and finished compost. It's growing cantaloupe right now and I will add some worms when I have more, just don't have enough to split right now. Compost mixed w/ vermicompost should make a great growing medium.

Hi Tango,

You got me pegged. ;)

I don't even particuliarly like squash. ;) I was just testing to see what would happen. I haven't been disappointed yet.

wormdude

Teehee. You piqued my interest with the goji berries, I meant to ask you about them. I guess they are going well! How do they taste?

(looking for new berries to try, i cant get my soil acidic enough [or something else] for blueberries to thrive grow here)

Hi tango,

They start out sweet, followed by a slightly bitter aftertaste. The term I have heard to describe them was that they taste "Dusty". I had never eaten them before growing them.

I like them better dried, and all I do to dry them is keep them on a sheet of wax paper. I don't really want to leave them in the sun, where I could end up eating a mouthful of fly larve ;)

From what I am told, they are best put in smoothies or baked in products like cupcakes.

If they weren't considered so dang healthy, I wouldn't bother eating them. I have no idea if the published claims are factual.

growing in all worm castings sounds like a great idea. I started an apartment bin a couple years ago. I grow mainly vegetables on my patio and garden. The problem I have is I didn't produce enough in the off season. It has been working awesome for seed mix and seedlings. I cut it with several other composts for container growing to make it last. Now that I got the hang of the worm bin I split to two bins ( my girlfriend loves it). I'm ready for a double harvest now and am considering splitting to 4 bins. In the meantime I have handed over worms to 3 different people to start their own bins.