It might be more genteel to say a harvest of worm castings, but no one ever knows what I’m talking about when I use that term. Castings or manure, I took advantage of the warm day to bring my worm farm out of the basement and begin the harvest
I dumped the whole bin full of worms, bedding and manure out onto a plastic sheet, and let that rest and give the worms time to dive deep into the bedding away from the bright sun while I rinsed out the bin and put in a layer of damp shredded newspaper.
Worms always move away from the sun which means it is pretty easy to remove the top layer of bedding and castings without getting too many worms. That layer goes immediately into the wheelbarrow. Then I go through the rest of the bedding to separate out the worms, throwing them back into the bin, and throwing the bedding and castings into the wheelbarrow. Sometimes I’d come across a whole nest of worms in the matted wet newspaper so I’d throw all that into the worm bin. Throwing some of the old bedding and castings into the new bin is fine. It is even good for the new bin.
I was very happy to see that I have a good population of worms including tiny baby worms. If they are reproducing I must have a good system going. I moved the bin into my basement at the end of August when night time temperatures routinely went below 50 degrees which is the lowest temperature these red wigglers can stand. The basement temperatures remain a fairly constant 50 degrees through the winter. The worms did survive their first winter, but they do not thrive at those temperatures so manure production goes down, but with luck there will be another good harvest in the early spring.
Some of my blogging friends are collecting a harvest of award nominations and all of you, not only bloggers, can go to www.Blotanical.com and vote for your favorite blog in a whole array of categories. Some of my favorite blogs have been nominated for Best U.S. Blog – namely: Faire Garden, A Garden in Progress, My Secret Garden, Garden Rant, and Hoe and Shovel.
Other favorites have been nominated at Best Educational Garden Blog – namely: May Dreams Gardens, In the Garden, Little Green Fingers and Hayefield.
Nomination season at Blotanical is an especially good time to discover some of the best and most beautiful blogs, blogs from other countries, and blogs that might fit your own special interests. Be sure and check them out.
Hi Pat, you are too sweet to mention the voting going on at Blotanical, thanks for that and the link love too. I had to laugh at people not knowing what castings were, but we all know the meaning of manure. Maybe gardeners know it a little differently than most though. I envy your basement with that constant temperture. We tried the worm bin in the garage but it was too cold in the winter and the house is too warm. I’ll bet those castings are worth their weight in gold to the garden though. My favorite nursery sells it in bags, A little pricey but wonderful stuff.
Frances
I’m thinking of trying a worm bin sometime, I think my girls would love helping me with them. I know the garden loves their manure 🙂
Thank you for visiting my blog today — I’m so glad you did, because it led me right back to your blog, which greeted me with WORMS! I smiled immediately. My son did an exhibit on worm composting at school, and we look forward to setting bins up at home one day (right now we just have traditional method). Great post, and great blog! And thank you for your kind words back on my blog — you made me smile then, too! Please visit anytime!
Frances – No one deserves several Blotanical awards than you do! I put my castings right out into the garden yesterday, a section that was in special need of attention. And then we got rain. Perfect.
Catherine – my grandsons helped set up the original bin and always feed the worms when they visit. I highly recommend Worms Eat My Garbage by Apelhof as a manual for full information.
Meredith – thanks for visiting and Congratulations again! Locally the Waste Management office works with schools to set up classroom worm bins. A great science lesson, as your son knows.
Pat
I envy your basement too Pat… would never happen here beneath my 1790 house… mostly crawl space… a realm I am petrified to enter. I envy too your crop of worms so busy working for your soil. Thanks again for the Blotanical tip!
I envy your basement too Pat… would never happen here beneath my 1790 house… mostly crawl space… a realm I am petrified to enter. I envy too your crop of worms so busy working for your soil. Thanks again for the Blotanical tip!
Forgot to say great post. Looking forward to reading the next one!