I have never seen a composting tumbler up close and need some points clarified. Guess there are no draining/air holes. So, how will you wash/flush away the stinky sludge. I agree with you about it being toxic.

I also hope you haven't tumble your tumbler since you added worms to it. Still, cannot imagine the contents vs the size of your tumbler. But, bear with me.

Move the contents to 1 side and let the excess liquid collect at the bottom. Better still if for this exercise you could elevate 1 side for the liquid to pool to the lower side. Scoop out any liquid you can, don't worry if you can't.

Do you have a PetSmart or any pet store in the neighbourhood? They use compressed saw dust pellets for bedding in some of their cages. Or some paper product similar to egg cartons but more absorbent. They clean the cages once a week and are happy to give it to you. I am sure these things are safe for worms since they HAVE to be safe for the animals they sell, except for the amount of urine in them but not to worry as long as it is to the other side of where the worms are. These are excellent absorbents and in time will become compost as well.

No pet store near by? Not to worry. ANY store nearby? I am sure they have corrugated cardboard. Get the dull (not shiny or sturdy) CCB (corrugated card board). If they have only strong north american ones, well, that will have to do but it will take longer to break down and not as absorbent. We work with what we get (smile) and beggars can't be choosy (sometimes).

Score the CCB across the ribs/spine so it's easy to make multiple folds to fit the bottom of your tumbler. the reason to score/cut across the spine, in time, worms will squiggle in there, they just love it, a good place to rub off their cocoons, rich with microbes. If you do not cut the ribs, it will be a never ending tunnel for the worms and they will be trapped in there. Sure, it will break down with time and you think they will be freed. BUT, by then there might be too much compost built up on top of it and depending on what specie of worms you've got, they might not be able to free themselves, being a NON burrowing worm. You missed the opportunity on a speedier population increase. We (at least I am) are very impatient when it comes to worming.

During all this, not to worry if your pile starts to crumble down converging, just do your best. It's not engineering a high rise of some sorts.

You can use newspaper (the dull ones, not shiny) but they tend to stick together. So, if you cannot get CCB, use newspaper SHEETS and crumble them, which will delay the clumping process and allow to store some air in the meantime.

How about egg shells? No egg shells? Not to worry. Go to a cafe serving breakfast. I did. They saved the egg shells for me, the ends of bread and other stuff in there so I had to go through it and separate the egg shells BECAUSE I put egg shells in the oven using the residual heat after baking or whatever, which make the eggshells brittle and easier to crumble/powder. You NEED egg shells when vermicomposting. I do not believe about the worms needing egg shells for their digestive system but I do believe about the calcium in egg shells to bind acid around the environment. Not to worry using too much egg shells because it will not change the pH in your bin, they will just be there as egg shells, unless there is acid to bind. At least, that's what I have read and I believe it. If you have a shredder, pile a lot of shredded newspaper on top of the wormy pile. My opinion same as to egg shells, never too much shredded paper on top.

I hope I have addressed the immediate remedy. BTW, I wouldn't dump the mess before I try the above. Please update us of your or the tumbler's progress. Thanks.

JV, just wanted add that I too have had good success in raising red wigglers in a large tumbler bin. It was at least 30-40gal. As long as the bin moisture was ok the worms did really well........easy to mix/aerate well too ("ComposTumbler brand with large handle). Located at my fathers house about 20mi away so haven't used it in the past few years. I should get it stocked again with some worms and give it another go, or better yet, move it to my house since my Dad doesn't really use it any more.

Hi all, thanks very much for the comments. A quick update on this 'adventure', pretty positive so far:

- I ended up running water over the tumbler about once a week. This seemed to do the trick to keep the smell down, so I assume that it was washing away / diluting the anaerobics.

- After some washing over time, I put all of the tumbler contents and shifted it to a standard rubbermaid container, following most typical designs. In the process, I about doubled the volume of content by adding in a lot of cardboard (thanks to Costco).

I did notice that when I cleaned out the tumbler that the reds seemed to be thriving in there, with lots of new adds. Part of me wonders if I should have left them alone in the tumbler.

@harry757 - How did you manage to empty your tumbler when it was harvest time. I would consider going back to using the tumbler, since they seemed to be doing so well in there, but in order to remove the contents I had to get seriously down and dirty, which I'd rather not do frequently. Maybe just leave the remnants in there as a seed starter for a new batch?

All in all, I see the process of having some decent soil amendment coming soon. It does take a while to get enough reds bred to stay up to speed, but I'll keep experimenting with a system that works for me!

Sounds like you've found your way. My simple rule of thumb: too much greens and water is stinky and can be deadly, too much bedding (like cardboard) is never a problem. So load it up with bedding if ever in doubt, as much as you can. Cardboard is good because it can soak up a fair bit of water, and has structure, so it doesnt' just reduce into a goopy mess like newspaper. Never used a tumbler, but I actually don't think tumbling it once in a while would harm the worms - and may help move the goopy stuff at the bottom around and mix it.

All that said, I've found worms far more tolerant of stinky wet stuff than I am (and some people think they are); their tolerance for wet and stink is pretty high. I'm not saying a bin should consist of only a goopy mess, but a bit at the bottom that's stinky won't kill them; they'll avoid it when they need to.

My one suggestion: don't 'wash' the contents with clean water - that's not a good idea as you're keeping it/making it too wet. The problem is not that the water is 'dirty', but that there's too much of it to start with and not enough air (really wet stuff blocks air and makes it anaerobic). Drain any excess water/leachate if you can, and if you can't, get lots of extra bedding in there to soak it up, and move the pile around to get more air in there. As someone wrote above, aerating it (any way you can including extra bedding) will deal with the stink - aerobic bacteria will come in and eat the anaerobic ones.

Final suggestion: I find a good thick layer of bedding on top (cardboard or shredded paper) also helps; it'll absorb humidity in the bin slowly and block odours and help to buffer the various swings in conditions inside. (It'll also eventually break down too without much effort)

JV, re getting the material out of the tumbler, I would just scoop out what I needed or empty the whole works into a wheelbarrow. Just had to rotate the tumbler so the open hatch was at towards the bottom. Then I sorted it out in a sunny spot to get the worms back into the bin.

Now that I think of it, I'm sure I hadn't even stocked it with worms intentionally, there must have been some of them in the horse manure I put in the bin when I first started it up.

Since them I have made trips down to some fairly local stables to dig around in their massive pile of horse manure to see if I could find any pockets of red wigglers. Never had much success but the worms I have in my bins at home loved the manure I brought back with me!