Adventures in Vermiculture - Part 3

Things have been quiet on the worm front. I check on them every few days and for the most part there are always a few hanging out in the upper bedding and food area, but the rest are hiding down farther.

One down side of using the one quart container as my starter bin is the lack of space to dig around and see how they're doing. Can't really poke around more than a couple inches down without fear of causing harm since there's no place for them to move to quickly.

Their food intake has been pretty slow. The last feeding was three weeks ago and they're just now to the point where they could handle another filter's worth of coffee grounds. I think this is partly caused by the low temps (~55 deg F) in our basement. I knew this would affect their activity level, but had hoped setting them on top of the water heater would help. Apparently it is not enough.

Although everything I have read indicates they will rapidly move away from light, they have not displayed that activity to the level I expected when checking on them. I am wondering if they are sensitive to ultraviolet light which is lacking in the florescent shop lights of my workbench.

Fun fact about florescent light from a faq on GE's website:

"The amount of UV produced by standard fluorescent lamps, such as those in your office, home, or school, is not hazardous and does not pose a major health concern. In fact, a paper by the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA) explores this subject in more detail. It cites a study in which it was determined that UV exposure from sitting indoors under fluorescent lights at typical office light levels for an eight-hour workday is equivalent to just over a minute of exposure to the sun in Washington, D.C. on a clear day in July."

Since it is the UV rays which damage human skin, it would make sense that even primitive creatures would be damaged in a similar way. Dehydration is probably more threatening to a worm than sunburn, but for a ground dwelling creature, sunburn alone would probably be deadly.

Adventures in Vermiculture - Part 2

Fed the worms yesterday for the first time since setting them up in their mini-bin. Of the 1 pot worth of coffee grounds and 3 or so apple peels I had started them with, there was nothing left! In fact, I probably needed to feed them sooner than the week and a half I waited.

The worms appear to have made themselves at home, occupying nearly the entire bin, including the feeding zone and the top layer of bedding. For this week I have fed them two pots worth of coffee grounds and a quarter to half of an apple worth of peels. I also smashed up an inch or two worth of egg shell to see how well they like that.

The rule of thumb for feeding is 2:1 per day, meaning the worms will eat as much as half their weight in food each day. I'd like to manage once a week feedings, so I am likely underfeeding slightly still.

The worms live in the basement, which is rather cool this time of year (~55 degrees) so I have placed them on top of the water heater to keep them just a little warmer and more active.

Adventures in Vermiculture - Part 1

I've been interested in vermiculture, composting with worms, for awhile now. With our back yard currently 3 feet deep in snow, anything to avoid making a trip to the compost pile sounds like a good idea!

Although interested, I'm not ready to jump head first into a full size bin setup. So I'm starting extremely small scale. My local Walmart stocks a small fridge worth of live bait. One of the items they carry are called "trout worms", which appear to be a variety of red worm. Since i can't be sure what type of worms they are, this is to be considered just an experiment.

Most sites recommend a 1lb package of worms to start a bin. The going price seems to be in the $15-20 range. For an experiment, i wasn't interested in laying out that much (plus shipping). The bait shop price was $3 for 30 worms (I actually got a one worm bonus for what it is worth). The per worm price is not so good, but the total outlay is just right.

With such a small starting herd, it makes sense to keep the worms in close contact to promote reproduction. As a result, I built their starter bin from a 1qt yogurt container. The bottom and lid have several 1/8" holes drilled in them for air and drainage.

Following common recommendations, I put together the micro-bin with shredded newspaper bedding in the bottom half of the container. In the middle is the medium the worms came in, plus one pot worth of coffee grounds and a few apple peels for food variety. On top is more newspaper bedding. Water was added until it dripped out the bottom.

I would like to add a few tablespoons of dirt to provide the grit needed for worm digestion. But as mentioned, the yard is under a ton of snow right now, so that will have to wait.

One week later...

The worms seem very comfortable and have reduced the provided food by quite a bit. What will be interesting to see is how long it takes to start increasing the population. Once they start multiplying I'll create a larger bin. Based on discussions seen on various websites I am anticipating it would take a year or more to build the population up to the 1 lb level. We shall see.