Supercharge your worm castings!

[pop22]

Dug around in my raised beds from last year, they're loaded with these worms! Wooooo! About to empty my current bin into the new raised bed in the greenhouse and start a new bin!

 

[hecno]

@pop22 I have a question for you , would something like this be ok to use .
5IN1TM Organic Plant Food is a brilliant organic plant food containing Cow, Fowl and Sheep Manures, Mushroom Compost, Zeolite, Blood & Bone, hoof and horn plus added Trace Elements and Minerals. Mix one part 5IN1TM Organic Plant Food to three parts existing soil to enrich the soil and provide long term organic nutrients to plants. Flowers and vegetables respond extremely well to this product.

It is granulated but I am thinking about putting it in a coffee grinder to turn it into a powder form to feed the worms .

 

[pop22]

Soak some with water to make it like a paste. keep it wet so it will breakdown. the worms and microlife in the castings will do the rest. I'm using a dry mix and that's how I do it. add it when you ad some other food waste. Look in your bin the next day, worms will likely be feeding like crazy!

@pop22 I have a question for you , would something like this be ok to use .
5IN1TM Organic Plant Food is a brilliant organic plant food containing Cow, Fowl and Sheep Manures, Mushroom Compost, Zeolite, Blood & Bone, hoof and horn plus added Trace Elements and Minerals. Mix one part 5IN1TM Organic Plant Food to three parts existing soil to enrich the soil and provide long term organic nutrients to plants. Flowers and vegetables respond extremely well to this product.

It is granulated but I am thinking about putting it in a coffee grinder to turn it into a powder form to feed the worms .

 

[Tommy McCain]

There's a saying: " garbage in = garbage out." Well, in the gardening world, garbage in = compost out!

and what goes into your compost makes a difference in the quality of the end product. worm castings are no different. What goes into the bin affects the nutrient content of the castings. the worms create nothing, they just process whats given to them into a form that is using to other micro life and plants.
If the food they get is low value, lacking in certain minerals, etc, its no better when the process is complete. And most people running small worm bins get wrong: They don't feed them EVERYTHING!

If bacteria can break it down, it belongs in your bin! meat, dairy, you name it, you can give to your worms. The key is to add these thing in small amounts. Milk and meat in particular break down much faster than plant matter. "spoiled" milk is perfect for your bin! a cup of it in a 15-20 gallon bin every 10 days or so works fine. A few scraps of meat, a few ounces every couple weeks, adds valuable nutrients to the mix.

But even if you don't want to use these things in your worm bins, here's a great way to produce worm castings superior to any you could buy. Add dry, organic nutrients to the bin! Grow More, Jobe's, doctor Earth, etc any brand will do. NPK ratios don't matter at all. A pound of dry nutes added at the rate of a cup every 10 days to a well populated worm bin will produce castings that will put any store bought nutrient to shame!
people also add sand, etc for "grit' to aid the digestive process of the worms. Well lets use useful grit!

The "father of fertilizer", Justus von Liebig, developed the "Law of the Minimum" which is important in understanding what micro nutrients do. The Law states that plant growth is determined by the scarcest "limiting" nutrient; if even one of the many required nutrients is deficient, the plant will not grow and produce at its optimum. Conventional fertilizer programs focus on the macro nutrients like Nitrogen (N), Phosphorus (P) and Potassium (K). However, if one of the many essential trace elements is deficient in the soil, the plant will not perform at its optimum, affecting yield and immune function.

So we can add Azomite and or similar sources of micro nutrients to our worm castings. Greensand also. and doing so creates a unique situation, these micro nutrients become available much more quickly! Most people don't realize that adding rock phosphate, azomite, greensand ( and my favorite bullshit " nutrient additive ) glacial rock dust. Glacial rock dust will take about 100 year to begin to be available....... and all the others mentioned aren't a lot better. 1-5 years for azomite and greensand.

But when processed thru a worm bin a usable amount of micro nutrients are made available because of the intensely active microlife in the bins!

I've just started adding these items to my bins. in about 90 days I'll be testing a soil mix composed of nothing but a base organic soil and these worm castings. I'll also mix a batch with just recycled soil and do a side by side comparison.

@pop22 have you every fed neem cake or meal? I have been throwing in a cup every so often for a year and the baby worms have multiplied like crazy. I was making a neem meal tea for fungus gnats (also recommend) and threw the leftovers in the worm bin. THE WORMS LOVE IT !! Then I did some reading and found out that many online have seen increased worm population and breading(more baby worms and cocoons). I usually have two 15 gallon smart pots full of manure going with worms.

Something else I have recently added to my smart pot worm bin is a Blumat. I would always forget to water my worms until it was too late and their population would dwindle significantly.

What do you recommend for a mineral addition to the worm bin? I currently use a mix of Azomite and basalt but do not add them to the bin. I also add copious amounts of kelp meal because I get it through a friend who buys bulk from Acadian Seaplant in Canada (I pay $1 a pound!). Do you think the minerals in the kelp would cover this?

 

[pop22]

Great tips! Especially the Blumats. I use neem cake but never though to put it in the worm bin!

I add Azomite mixed into whatever I'm feeding, you don't need much. Glacial dust, etc, is a waste of time, it take 100+ years to break down to a useable form.

@pop22 have you every fed neem cake or meal? I have been throwing in a cup every so often for a year and the baby worms have multiplied like crazy. I was making a neem meal tea for fungus gnats (also recommend) and threw the leftovers in the worm bin. THE WORMS LOVE IT !! Then I did some reading and found out that many online have seen increased worm population and breading(more baby worms and cocoons). I usually have two 15 gallon smart pots full of manure going with worms.

Something else I have recently added to my smart pot worm bin is a Blumat. I would always forget to water my worms until it was too late and their population would dwindle significantly.

What do you recommend for a mineral addition to the worm bin? I currently use a mix of Azomite and basalt but do not add them to the bin. I also add copious amounts of kelp meal because I get it through a friend who buys bulk from Acadian Seaplant in Canada (I pay $1 a pound!). Do you think the minerals in the kelp would cover this?

 

[Tommy McCain]

Great tips! Especially the Blumats. I use neem cake but never though to put it in the worm bin!

I add Azomite mixed into whatever I'm feeding, you don't need much. Glacial dust, etc, is a waste of time, it take 100+ years to break down to a useable form.

Got home and decided to feed the worms. Went and got some composted manure and mixed in the Azomite. Then I broke out the camera and thought I would takes some close ups. I moved the recent layer of neem and you can see the worms congregating under it (neem is the white and brown stuff in the top of the photo). Also, notice how quick (5 days) the neem gets a fungus growing in between. Neem is some badass shit.

I know how you dirty organic freaks like it...a little WORM BIN PORN!

There is definitely something going on in that top right corner. Microbes are in there just killing each other and having sex. JUST LIKE US.

@pop22 let me know if you add some neem and you notice happier worms. Thanks for the tips.

 

[Need4Weed]

Very interesting!

 

[hecno]

That photo says it all ,

 

[4tokin]

After reading this thread I have started to actively feed my worm farm.
I have a bucket of old potting mix that I have heavily amended that gets sprinkled over the worms once a week. They seem to like it.
What has really fattened the worms up is powdered baby formula which is dusted over the worm bin weekly.

 

[Tommy McCain]

Alright you savages. I have something else to add to your worm bin and compost bin. Malted Barley Powder. I buy malted barley and grind it with my coffee grinder. It is dirt cheap. I pay around $10 for 10 pounds and it lasts forever.
Why would I want to add MBP to my worms you may ask? Well besides the fact that my worms go crazy for it (see photo), it is actually good for your plants. Below is some information I have collected from other sites and sources. Again, I always preference this with, I did not invent this. I just think it works and growers on AFN are not aware of it. So I am spreading the info.
This is going to be extremely simplified because I am a simple person. I am also in the process of learning this information so be gentle with me....

Lets start with enzymes. Enzymes are catalysts that effect the biological functions of every living thing. From what I understand we can even lump bacteria and fungus in this. Worm castings are a perfect example because worms release an enzyme that causes a "partnership" with certain microbes.

Seeds contain different enzymes for growth. All nutrients for a plant to survive the first few weeks are in the seed in the form of protein and enzymes. When a seed is germinated there is an internal change in these enzymes and they get activated from germination-inhibitory enzymes to enzymes that cause vibrant young seedlings. Malting is a controlled germinating of a seed in order to get access to certain enzymes (I do not understand the brewing process so this is where I stop). Our plants can use many of these enzymes as well as the microbes and other members of our indoor soil food web.

The next benefit to these seeds are the hormones they contain. The ones we want to discuss directly are Cytokinins. Cytokinins are compounds that help with many functions but specifically cell division.

Cytokinins have been found in almost all higher plants as well as mosses, fungi, bacteria, and also in tRNA of many prokaryotes and eukaryotes. Today there are more than 200 natural and synthetic cytokinins combined. Cytokinin concentrations are highest in meristematic regions and areas of continuous growth potential such as roots, young leaves, developing fruits, and seeds (Arteca, 1996; Mauseth, 1991; Raven, 1992; Salisbury and Ross, 1992).

Cytokinin Functions

A list of some of the known physiological effects caused by cytokinins are listed below. The response will vary depending on the type of cytokinin and plant species (Davies, 1995; Mauseth, 1991; Raven, 1992; Salisbury and Ross, 1992).

• Stimulates cell division.
• Stimulates morphogenesis (shoot initiation/bud formation) in tissue culture.
• Stimulates the growth of lateral buds-release of apical dominance.
• Stimulates leaf expansion resulting from cell enlargement.
• May enhance stomatal opening in some species.
• Promotes the conversion of etioplasts into chloroplasts via stimulation of chlorophyll synthesis.

Also, I have heard that this can reduce flowering time with plants. This comes from many sources (reliable) online. I have never tested this but heard from various growers that it is true.

This is deep stuff but you can see the benefits of adding this to your worm bin and as I do my plants and soil.

This is what it looks like when I first add it to the worm bin. I water it in.

This is four days later. I love the Santa's Beard already.

I pulled back the MBP to find a party. These are all mainly baby worms!! Love seeing happy young worms.

Ten lb bag.