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henryl65

worm bin questions

9 years ago

I started about June 16 or so (worm factory 360), so it
hasn’t quite been a month. I bought one lb of worms, so approximately 1000 I
think. I am already to 1 and a half trays, so maybe I’m just feeding too much.
We have a garden and we eat a lot of veggies and fruit, so we end up with a lot
of potential worm food (peelings, trimmings, veggies that go bad before we can
eat them or put them up). Based on what I've read, I should only be feeding
after they have eaten the previous feeding? That correct?

I had the bin in my garage, which was ok in June…but in July
it gets pretty hot where I am in the northern half of Georgia. The garage temp
has been around 80 to 84, but last night I took the temp of the bedding and it
was closer to 94, so this morning I brought the bin inside. Regarding the worm
movement, when I first started they would definitely move towards food, but now
they seem pretty sluggish (may be the heat?). They tend to stay at the outside
edge of the trays…maybe trying to avoid the heat coming from the center?

Also, I seem to have a strong population of fly larva. They
don’t bother me, and I understand their castings are beneficial too, but it
makes me think my conditions aren’t yet ideal for the worms. Would love
suggestions/comments for improvement!

Comments (3)

  • 9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Since no one has yet replied to your opening posting I will offer things for you to think about...

    What kind of worms did you get? Africans are okay with those temperatures... red wigglers? not so much. If the bin temperatures are exceeding the air temperature then either its in the sun, lacking sufficient air movement or too much greens and it is hot composting. If you've got a lot of garden trimmings try composting in a traditional compost pile... then after its cooled down you can feed a portion to the worms when they require more food. Bottom line: excessive heat will kill your worms. If you do have red wigglers, strive for temperature in the 70s... bin temps above 84F will definitely stress them.

    Fly larvae? What kind of fly we talking 'bout? Bottle flies? Blow flies? I would not want these in my house. Larva eventually become adult flies... If you are referring to Black Soldier Fly larva, then they will not be a bother in the bin, however I doubt you'd want the adults in your house... but really, since they would need earth (actual soil) to burrow in to transform into the adult (pupate), you're more likely to find dead larva lying around every where in the house as they dried out after escaping the bin in search of soil to burrow into. Outdoors the BSF larva would not be an issue, however know that the larva are voracious eaters and will thus compete with your worms for food with the downside being the BSFL consume much more and yet return far less of it as castings, which wouldn't be an issue if you used them to feed to chickens or fish however if they instead escape the bin to pupate then all that nitrogen (as protein) etc will be lost from the castings left in the bin. BSFL can slip through tiny cracks seeking the earth they need to pupate in to transform into the adult form (metamorphosis)... this stage simply CANNOT be achieved in the bin, they MUST escape to burrow into earth.

    Now for suggestions... I would suggest doing whatever you need to do to maintain bin temperatures below 80F... even if you have to dig a hole in deep shade (backyard), put the bin in and cover over with either plywood or a kiddie wading pool (with an inch or so of water). Traditionally compost anything in excess of what the worms can consume and use the partial compost that has cooled to feed the worms later if need be. Finally, I suggest that unless you have a need for BSFL, you don't want them in your worm bin as they are very inefficient if you're trying to simply recycle garden wastes into castings. And if you have any other type fly larva in your bin... Eeeeww.

    Hopefully you will get other responses soon....

    HenryL65 thanked monomer
  • 9 years ago

    Thanks for the response monomer. They are red wigglers, so I think the heat was definitely stressing them out. Regarding traditional compost...already doing that...to the extreme (I have 5 compost piles going now plus 2 leaf mold piles...we're big into composting...).

    Regarding the fly larva, based on the pictures I've seen, they are BSFL. Maybe I will just pick them out as I see find them and toss 'em outside for the birds (eventually chickens). Maybe as the bin gets better air flow and I remove them their numbers will dwindle or die off. Unfortunately, in Georgia in July, the only option I have to keep the bin below 80 is to bring it inside. It was in my garage, in the shade, sitting on cool concrete but it was still too hot.

    Any thoughts on the frequency of feeding? And how about the ratio of green to brown? I read 50/50 but is that by weight or by volume? I think one of my initial mistakes was feeding too frequently and feeding too much green.

  • 9 years ago

    If you have plenty of outdoor compost going, you don't need to overload your worm bin the way you've been doing. Slow and conservative at the outset is always the best advice. With monomer, I suspect you've been adding too much material that's hot composting in the bin, adding to the overheating problem.

    You don't need to have a "green"/"brown" ratio in a worm bin the way you do in hot composting. You are not looking to have thermophilic bacteria building up in the bin, generating heat and stressing or killing your worms. The more important distinction in a worm bin is between food scraps and bedding material, because food scraps break down quickly and release a lot of moisture, and bedding breaks down much more slowly and absorbs and distributes moisture, allowing the circulation of air throughout the bin. It sounds like you are adding lots of food scraps and not enough bedding to absorb and distribute the excess moisture they generate.

    Black soldier flies and worms aren't meant to co-exist in the same bin. Black soldier flies excel at breaking down lots of food material very fast, but in the process they also use up a lot of the energy in the food and convert a lot of the nutrition in the food into their own bodies, in contrast to worms which grow much more slowly, have much slower metabolisms and leave behind a lot more castings with higher levels of plant-available nutrients. Black soldier flies are also not something you want in an indoor bin.

    Have you got an indoor area that is relatively cool, such as a cellar or basement, where you can keep the bin? I would consider keeping the bin indoors on a permanent basis, and selectively feeding it only with food scraps from the human food supply, much more slowly than you've been doing.

    It's good that you have outdoor compost too because if you have a household generating lots of scraps you may often find yourself with more scraps than your worm bin can handle, and then the excess can go in an outdoor compost pile. You could also consider a flow-through worm bin with larger capacity such as the larger model of the Worm Inn, or a homemade flow-through bin.

    HenryL65 thanked theparsley
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