Red Worm Composting
I have been reading EcoSherpa | Sustainable Living, Compost Guy | Turning Wastes Into Resources, and Red Worm Composting for several months now. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I am interested in starting a compost bin near my garden. This bin would be my first foray into outdoor composting (my parents certainly never composted), and Bentley lives in Canada, and thus he experiments with winter composting. As my recent snow pictures show, I also have to be concerned about temperatures dropping in the winter.
For the past six months or so, I've been looking at worm systems for interior composting. I also have absolutely zilch experience with this, but I never let that stop me from doing something. As can be seen by my Lettuce Project, I am interested in finding ways to feed my red-eared slider turtle locally and for cheaper. Red wrigglers, a source of food for my slider, are the worms used in worm composting.
I have no idea if it is a good idea to use red wrigglers from the interior bin to feed my turtle or not, but I figure if I'm "feeding" the wrigglers organic food left-overs from my garden and newspaper or cardboard not sprayed with paint or some other harmful substance, they shouldn't be able to harm my turtle, right? And apparently, if you get a bin set up really well, they will reproduce. Of course, I need to keep enough worms in the bin to compost the bin, but I think they could provide a nice snack for Timothy. Follow my reasoning?
Last night, I set out to make a deluxe bin as instructed by Bentley. Aaron found a set of tubs at Wal-Mart that are made of 75% pre- and post-consumer plastic, I placed quite a bit of cardboard and newspaper (mixed about equally and shredded into small inch x inch pieces) into my bin and now I'm starting to cover it with food waste. In a few weeks, after my bin has quite a bit more food waste and bedding layered into it, I will order some worms. I'll keep you updated on how it works!
I didn't make this picture pretty at all, just snapped and uploaded. Sorry - didn't have the time! :)
Bentley's Deluxe Worm Bin Video
Timothy and Kai having a little chat:
Labels: environment, gardening
posted by Jen at
11:33 AM
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4 Comments
4 Comments:
Seems a pretty good idea to me. Hope it works out well for both you and Timothy!
26 February, 2008 21:53
you know, Jen, you are inspiring. I watched that video and thought, Hey, I could do that too! Don't know that I will (I already recycle food, but do so through the city program), but it makes me think...about all the really good stuff I COULD throw in my veggie garden! Looks like a kinda fun science experimet for you and your kiddies...THAT is most interesting to me!
27 February, 2008 02:37
My dad composted his garden, and it made a big difference. Man, I miss all those fresh vegetables in the summer!
Good luck! Once they get going, they aren't much trouble to maintain.
27 February, 2008 08:01
We just use the horse manure and it works well. Hey, I have an idea. I can send you all the worms that live under the horses's water trough. You think?
27 February, 2008 08:08
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