Compost

[TeeDee]

Well my worms have arrive and been put into a hasty stay over box along with some food and soaked wet cardboard shreds. Which seems to be the fashion.


Just picked up some large bucket totes to make into three stackable wormeries with different layers.

I'll split the group into Four equal sized packs and see how they do and hopefully multiply.
Seems to very much be a game of 'leave them to it' which I absolutely will then have a poke and nosey around in the Xmas period.

 

[Moondog55]

Worms mate by accident so you don't want the worm population sparse. Don't split into 4 sets until the worm population at least doubles

 

[TeeDee]

Worms mate by accident so you don't want the worm population sparse. Don't split into 4 sets until the worm population at least doubles

Good call


I'll crush up some viagra and sprinkle it over their food also.

Should get them in the mood.


Or make them immobile. One or the other.

 

[Moondog55]

I was told by a local expert that worms can process food scraps faster and more easily if ground small, so I sometimes use the Magimix in the scraps bucket. Also worms love coffee grounds but only if not too acid some I sprinkle a little lime in the tub every now and then. Rats got into my worm farm over winter and ate a lot of them, it will take at least two years to recover. So make sure the bins are vermin proof

 

[Paul_B]

We got a few compost daleks when we bought the house. We never seem to get enough material in them to get good compost. However the time we had a large bulk carrier in the front garden with mostly green waste (grass cuttings from our only lawn, weeds pulled up from the lawn and borders plus other green waste). When we tried to move it to get rid after realising it was too full we had to take stuff out by hand into the green bins. We got down a layer and it was very nearly composted from the last lawn mowing (about a month or so ago) and then the layer underneath looked like good compost and the lowest layers were like a wet peat type of compost all friable and probably quite good for plants.

So I have learnt that the best compost we can make is when we have been lazy and not emptied a bulk carrier bag of garden waste. The daleks for us are absolutely useless no matter how much care I take and how much of the various compost additives from the garden centre we get to spinkle into each layer.

Mind you they are at the top of the garden and most waste seems to be from below them and easier to take down to the green bins. I think we need a better location for them in order to give composting a better try.

Does anyone have a better composting container than daleks? Do you think those rubble sacks we accidentally get half decent compost are better? Anything else that is good for a composter? Why did those rubble sacks work for us and the daleks didn't? The daleks were the only ones I tried to get a mix of green and brown waste in (mostly wood chippings and green weeds / old vegetation in the daleks and all grass clippings and green weeds/garden waste in the rubble sacks). The daleks should have given better compost surely?

 

[slowworm]

To make compost quickly you not only need a mix of woody and green material but also air and it needs moisture. The plastic bins may not always provide an ideal environment but they are fairly cheap to get hold of and easy to use.

To improve things you can build up a pile of suitable material and then load a bin. Emptying them out and turning the pile before reloading also helps. Or get several and be patient.

Urine can also help add moisture, nitrogen and other nutrients - use a step ladder if you're short!

 

[Pattree]

Urine can also help add moisture, nitrogen and other nutrients

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