Vermicomposting - I got worms!

Composting - Because my "soil" is actually clay

My home is in an old river-bed, and all the ground is all clay. Digging is a bitch, oxygen doesn't make it very deep into the ground, and it's just not great for gardening. The original owners of the house imported a bunch of black topsoil, but the imported topsoil was just black clay, so, that's what we have. 

My neighbor composts. Everyone in the neighborhood gives him their grass clippings and autumn leaves, he digs a hole in his garden (which is huge) and he throws everything in there. He even throws all his household trash in his garden. Once a week he throws half of a paper bag full of household trash in the dumpster. I wish I could be him, but my wife won't let me have a landfill in our backyard. So I researched some smaller-scale composting options, and composting with worms (vermicomposting) sounded like the best way to go. 

Worm Farming

I never thought I'd be able to say, "I've got worms" without being in a doctor's office, but, here I am. I chose to vermicompost because it can be done without spending a lot of money, indoors, it doesn't take a lot of work, and it's low-impact on your environment (no garbage heap or stink). Worm castings (fancy word for poop) are about the best soil possible, and instead of taking a year to turn trash into compost, it takes a few months. It was a perfect project to start in the winter. 

There are countless guides and slightly differing methods for vermicomposting so I won't rehash them all here, but here's one bearded guy's website explaining the process I basically used. Another great resource I found was this video describing the process of setting up a bin. For step by step directions, follow the link, but here's a synopsis:

Gettin' shit together - to get worm shit

Purchase

• 2 storage bins ($10)
• 1 pound of Red Wiggler worms ($40)

Prepare

1. Drill holes in the bottoms  and around the top your bins
2. Shred paper, cardboard, or dry leaves till you have 2-3 inches lining the bottom of the bin
3. Spray with water till the paper is damp, not soaked (it's easier to add more water in the future than it is to dry it out)
4. Throw in a handful of dirt 
5. Add your worms
6. Put a small bit of food in
7. Cover everything with 1-2 more inches of paper or leaves
8. Spray them so they're damp
9. You can open your bin to make sure it's not too wet, but don't move the paper, leaves, or food for 2 weeks
10. After 2 weeks put a small amount of food in again and cover with bedding
11. After several weeks your worms will be settled and you can add more food, every week
12. After 3-4 months you should have a bucket full of worm castings, prepare your second bin and set it on top of the first bin. After a month or so all the worms should migrate up to the second bin to get the new food and you can harvest your castings. 

Sounds simple, right? Not so fast. I learned some lessons along the way. The first of which was, it's hard to find a reliable worm supplier. Seriously I should get into that business. First I tried Amazon, and after waiting a couple weeks I got a stinky bag of mushy decomposing worms. Then I tried a local guy (worm guys are exactly how you would imagine them) who made three separate appointments to sell me worms. Finally, he made the appointment and I drove away with 1/2 lbs. of worms - I should have gone with a full pound. 

Lessons Learned

Lesson 1: Don't get it too wet

Some websites will tell you to dip the paper in water and then squeeze the water out when you prepare your bin. This will leave your bin way too wet. I did that, and for the first month, every time I looked in my bin there were worms lining the top, trying to escape. There was also condensation dropping of the lid and down the sides. If there's condensation in your bin, it's too wet. I had to add more dry bedding and drill a lot more holes in by bin's lid. 

Lesson 2: Feed them slowly

My bin is currently covered in (what I think is) mold and until recently it was getting stinky. Your bin should smell like dirt, not rotting food. If you've got tons of mold or it's stinky, take a couple weeks off feeding your worms. Let them catch up. The mold and stench also improved when I dumped 2-3 inches of dry, mulched leaves on top of everything. I severely underestimated how much food waste I had - but I've got a two-year-old, so entire meals go to waste pretty much every day.

Vermicompost mold

Today's lunch, going straight in the bin.

* I should note, someone mentioned that the sugary bread could be a contributor to my mite/mold issue. Since then I realized, most of the bread I've put in the bin was still there in a gross moldy mass, so I took it out, and I've stopped adding bread.

Lesson 3: Don't stir!

I thought stirring my compost would help the process. I thought stirring it would disrupt the mold spores. And I just wanted to see my worms to see if they're eating stuff. Don't! If you mess with your compost bin too much you'll go blind.

Feel the bedding to make sure it's a little damp, and just lift a little of the top layer of bedding when you add more food, then re-bury it. I love tinkering, and I constantly have to resist that urge. 

To be continued...

I'll probably update this post when I harvest my castings and get my second bin going. It seems like the composting is coming along now, and I feel much more confident now that I've worked through those growing pains.

** Update**

So, I watched this guy's youtube series where he made a bin exclusively with paper, coffee grounds, and egg shells, and he stirred the crap out of his bin when he was going through it every few weeks. It made me wonder, "What's at the bottom of my bin?" and I'm horrified at the results. 

The bottom half of my bin is heavy, sticky, smelly, and gooey. I'm reaching out right now on Reddit r/Vermiculture to find out if my results are normal. 

Overall view

Slightly blurry close up - but you can really see the gooeyness

There are worms everywhere in my bin (except the very middle section, which I realized is a little dry, and I've never placed food in the middle of the bin. I also saw some baby worms while I was digging around, so those are good signs. There was also only one worm on the side of the bin when I opened it up, so that's also good.

I've recently started blending my food before putting it in the bin and feeding much less often because of all the moldy material I was seeing. I started this bin with shredded paper and cardboard, and I saw very little evidence of paper and cardboard in there. Since then my bedding has been dead dry leaves, and I still see a lot of that in there. Should I be doing something different?