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| The compost |
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| Worm crate |
One day, my beloved lady suggested Id start a worm composting bin. After coming back from my utter surprise, I quickly started the bin. That was back in august. After a modest start with 2 packs of worms form a fish bait shop, I got a half pound or red wigglers from the Lower East Side Ecology Center. I applied the basic principles gleaned from the Internet experts and a dose of common sense (or so I hope). So there is the results from the first "year":
Input: 1 pound and 3ounces of worms (the bait shop worms included)
5 kg (11 pounds) - dry weigh - of paper, cardboard, wood dust, dried leaves (actually more than that since i started to record this only later)
20 kg (45 pounds) of diverse food scraps, including supposed no-noes like onion peel, lemon, garlic ... in moderation, there is no problem really, and anything else vegetable based, and used coffee grounds Unknown amount of water - as I almost always put the scraps in the blender, I add some water for the blender to be able to do its job
Output: 3.18 kg (7 pounds) of dark moist earthy smelling dirt!
The crate is fairly small (~1 x 1.5 x 1 ft, or 11 gallons, or 31 x 48 x 31 cm, or 46 L); and because it is indoor, I have been prudent in adding too much food (~140 g a day or 0.3 lbs in average) . If I can, Id like to experiment with a larger system, maybe 2 x 3 x 2 feet and see how much can be put in it while following a similar feeding rate (I guess per surface unit).
The compost was used for a couple of house plants, to start seeds, and to brew compost tea. With the solids left from making compost tea -which contains some small worms and cocoons - I just started a composting bucket for the school project.
