Right now it's set up to produce worms more than castings in that I'm keeping it very wet.
I have it in an unheated barn that is open to the outside.
I dump the anerobic digester effluent in every few days and also mist the bed with the mist heads attached to the white PVC pipe a few feet above the bed.
The bin is constructed of PVC pipe and a Waste Management Bagster. I got the idea from Meme's Worms on YouTube.
The 1/2" hardware cloth keeps the skunks out. Before I had that the skunks would come in to eat the worms.
Here are some worms uncovered by scratching the surface a bit. They are a mix of Red Wiggler and European Night Crawlers:
They were overwintered in this bin just by stacking 18" of leaves above them... the temperature in the compost didn't go below 55 degrees F even though it was 5-10 degrees outside for a few weeks straight.
In addition to manure, straw, compost, shredded cardboard and shredded notices from the IRS, they are fed a mix of ground birdseed, ground corn, azomite, and biochar, all finely ground:
I throw a couple of handfuls on every day or two:
The plan is to expand the worms in this bin to the other bins in the background and set up mist systems above them all, as well as a gravity fed effluent distribution system.
Once up and running, I've read you can harvest 5-6 lbs of worms per square foot per year. Right now a pound of worms online is going for $40 and in the spring will be around $65 or so. Each Bagster bin is ~32 square feet so you can do the math.
To achieve this though I need to invest in some better separating methods like a trommel of some sort. The beds are also way to wet for any sort of automated separation right now. Right now I'm in production mode to grow out to the rest of the beds.
#worms #vermiculture #grownostr #plantstr #garden #valueprinting #moneyprinting