CANADIAN REGION: What are you doing in March 2018

Kelejan, you remind me of my mom - doesn't want to be in charge, but takes the job anyway.... I hope for you that they don't want to put you in charge either. You always sound like you've got enough going on without the added responsibility. :-)

sanderson wrote:I'm sorry to hear that the worms died.  Were they outside or inside?  I can't imagine spending an hour digging your way to the compost pile only to find it frozen!  That's so nice that your town has a women's center that you can visit when you are up to the walk.

Mea culpa with regard to the worms.  So much I did not do last year as I did feel a little under the weather with the long wet spring, the long hot and dry summer with winter seeming to come early.

The walk to the women's centre is good for me, along with the evening dog walk so I really am feeling a lot more chipper and ready to get out and do things.  It is a pleasure to be able to walk in shoes instead of boots.  Getting on for ten a.m. so will be going out into the garden that at the moment is bathed in bright sunshine and is rather hard to look out on to the white snow.  By 1pm it will all be in shadow but as the days go by I will get a good share of sunshine the I will be complaining again.

AtlantaMarie wrote:Kelejan, you remind me of my mom - doesn't want to be in charge, but takes the job anyway....  I hope for you that they don't want to put you in charge either.  You always sound like you've got enough going on without the added responsibility.  :-)

I am certainly not a leader, Marie, one reason I did not do well with my little stationery store when I took on staff when it got too much for me.  I make a good partner with the right person, or a sole worker.  I will certainly resist taking on a leadership role with the three 8x4 beds at the centre as I have more than enough to cope with my own garden which I intend to downsize somewhat so that I can enjoy it and not feel overwhelmed.

Like many of us we may start small but with success comes dreams of expanding the number of beds, then reality kicks in.  Like me collecting a 100 bags of leaves, producing 80 pounds of tomatoes and then having to process them or give them away, not to speak of the weeds that also appreciates the lovely nourishment they share with the veggies. 

This morning I dug into my compost heap with a trowel, the part that is thawing, and just under the surface there are loads of tiny compost worms.  I have to go out now, but when I return this afternoon the temperature will be warming and I will dig out as many worms as I can to add to my refurbished worm bin.

I will also take some to our women's group tomorrow as one of the subjects being discussed is  the raised gardens outside on the deck.  I hope to bring the discussion around to worms and compost.

I have made a miniature worm bin out of a plastic food saver and put in about 50 very tiny worms from my compost heap.  I will show them to our womaen's group to encourage them to put veggie fruit peelings in the coffee container that I have supplied, also to put the coffee ground into another container instead of putting everything into the trash can.

When returning home tomorrow I will place the 50 worms into my refurbished worm bin to carry on growing, to procreate and to make castings.

Most of the little worms I recovered were from the grass I put on top of the compost heap last fall.  The middle of the heap is still frozen and I am looking forward to when I can turn it and open up all the contents.

I enjoyed my little worm bin session with the ladies from my group who are going to  refurbishing the three 8x4 raised beds at the back of the premises.

I dismantled it onto a dinner plate layer by layer and explained how a larger one would be built from the bedding, adding grass, leaves, and food, and some moisture, then topping it with shredded paper and egg cartons and leaving it to mature for a couple of weeks before adding any worms.

They were interested to know that worms did not eat any plants and that their plants would be quite safe.  That the worms ate what was extruded from plant roots, plus the  microbes and all the other stuff that occurred from the decomposing vegetation which was why we were  NOT tossing the veggie, fruit scraps and coffee grounds into the garbage.

They had a good look at the 50 tiny worms I had gathered from my compost pile, that they grew  a band round their middles where the next generation grew in cocoons and that each little cocoon would would hatch several more tiny worms and so forth.

I told them about my tw- worm experiment in a yoghurt carton that tuned into 75 worms before I put them into my large worm bin.

I made them laugh when I told them that all my worms had names and that their names were "Fred", that my goldfish were all named "George" and all my boyfriends were named "Darling". I must not repeat that again there as it could get a bit tedious.

What pleased me was the interest they showed and were not squeamish about handling the worms and bedding, and that the person who is in charge of our gardening, having taken a course in organic gardening, did not know how worms reproduced.

What also pleased me was that it rained all day and there was no way I could get out into the garden.  Today it was supposed to rain again, but as the sky is still clear I will get out again to my compost pile.  I have brought my own worm bin into the house this morning as it is too cold outside, will let it warm up then place my 50 tiny worms in their new home, to be joined with many more later today.

Sounds like you AND they had a great time! :-)

AtlantaMarie wrote:Sounds like you AND they had a great time!  :-)

+1

KJ, Thank you for sharing. Sounds like everyone had a good time.

My seedlings are doing quite well. The parsley are finally starting to peak put. The Toms are getting a little big considering I can't put them out until mid- May at the earliest. I should have waited a bit longer before planting them. 

Thank you for sharing your warm stories KJ. I would like to jave my own worm colony one day.

Mimi2 wrote:Thank you for sharing your warm stories KJ. I would like to jave my own worm colony one day.

 Mimi, my worm colony git neglected last year but this year I feel energised so I am enjoying bringing it back to life.

I had a total of three worm bins, the Rubbermaid 18 liter size and I got several coffee containers of castings, enough for my own needs.  I had emptied the worm bins into my compost pile and that is where I am getting my new stock.  I like to think I sent them on a holiday.

Your seedlings look promising and I think you will have to transplant your toms before they outgrow their containers. I must admit I cheat and buy transplants.  Look froward to see what harvest you eventually get from them.

I still have lots of snow on my garden as I live on the north side of a hill; I visited my friend down the road a short while ago and she was working in her yard in full sunshine.  Imagine an Envy emoticon here.

Mimi2 wrote:Thank you for sharing your warm stories KJ. I would like to jave my own worm colony one day.

Me too, Mimi! I've got most of what I need to build a small flow-thru type, but just don't have the time right now. So I live vicariously through Kelejan's, lol!

AtlantaMarie wrote:

Mimi2 wrote:Thank you for sharing your warm stories KJ. I would like to jave my own worm colony one day.

Me too, Mimi!  I've got most of what I need to build a small flow-thru type, but just don't have the time right now.  So I live vicariously through Kelejan's, lol!

Me as well. But Mrs TD says there is no way I can have a worm bin in the house during the winter. I suppose I could do one outside during the good weather.

trolleydriver wrote:

AtlantaMarie wrote:

Mimi2 wrote:Thank you for sharing your warm stories KJ. I would like to jave my own worm colony one day.

Me too, Mimi!  I've got most of what I need to build a small flow-thru type, but just don't have the time right now.  So I live vicariously through Kelejan's, lol!

Me as well. But Mrs TD says there is no way I can have a worm bin in the house during the winter. I suppose I could do one outside during the good weather.

TD, may I suggest that you start one now outside, and then when winter arrives, give the worms a holiday in your outside compost heap where there will be enough compost there for the worms to work through during the winter. There will be enough biomass to keep the inner parts warm enough for the worms to continue growing,  consuming and producing castings.  When I started extracting my worms a couple of weeks ago, I was amazed at the number of little worms that were growing in the middle of the pile even though the outside parts were frozen. As the pile will start thawing I will continue extracting the worms and the remainder will continue to do their work.   

When I first moved into my house and built my first compost pile, I only had some of the larger earthworms there.  It was only some years later, when I added a bag of sheep manure that had compost worms, that my pile became really alive, and since then I have always had compost worms there.

I must admit I do wonder if my dear husband would have allowed me to have an indoor worm bin.   The winter of 1915/1916 I had an indoor worm bin in my living room for the first time and no visitor ever spotted it. Only readers of this forum know about it.

Marie: I have read about flo-through types and I am thinking about getting one of them.

Kelejan, if you're a youtube-type person, there's all sorts of good videos about them....

Good idea KJ. I thought the worms used for indoor composting are different than those found in the garden.

trolleydriver wrote:Good idea KJ. I thought the worms used for indoor composting are different than those found in the garden.

I have found that it seems easy to differentiate between compost and earth worms.  The earth worms are much fatter, longer and paler and for some reason I hate handling them.  The compost worms I have no squeamishness about handling.

Earth worms dig deep into the ground and the compost worms are near the surface where the layers of litter are.

The above is only my personal opinion and my gut reaction to worms.