New to purmaculture

[jeremy]

Must try to find other permaculture people here that I could meet up with.

have a look at this site:http://permacultureglobal.com/users.

[briansworms]

Hello Chris. to get your worm farm going can you put it through a garden seive? The material you sieve out use in your gardens and the bigger bit of material and the worms which will be tocether put them back into your farm. If possible get some horse or cow manure and put it into the farm at about 3" deep. Let it sit for a week and do it again. Your worms will breedup like crazy and in a couple of months you will triple your population.

After about 2 months sieve the farm again and do the same thing. This time you will put about 10 times the worm eggs in your garden which will all hatch in your garden beds. You will also have heaps of castings as well. With all your veggie scraps put them in the freezer over night then feed out to the worms. This is most important with potatoe peels. Have a look at my website listed below.

[Chris Willis]

Hi Brian and thank you so much for the invaluable help with the worm farm. I shall make sure that I follow your instructions and look forward to seeing the results :-)

[Chris Willis]

Thanks Jeremy...I appreciate that link :-)

[Chris Willis]

Hi Brian....I forgot to ask you. What is the significance of freezing the food over night before feeding it to the worms :-)

[briansworms]

Hi Brian....I forgot to ask you. What is the significance of freezing the food over night before feeding it to the worms :-)

Chris with potatoe peels especially they will remain nice and crisp in a worm farm and given the chance will grow spuds. The worms wont touch them unless they are breaking down. The freezing breaks down the cells and then the worms will start to eat it. I froze some cabbage once and then fed it to the worms. It didn't break down at all and remained quite healthy in the worm bin.
The alternative is what is called Bokashi. You put all your scraps in an air tight bag for a few weeks then feed it to the worms. The same result can be achieve by putting your scraps in a bag and leave out in the sun for a week. It all sounds terrible but what it does is grow bacteria which is what the worms actually eat. Bacteria causes the smell but in a healthy worm farm there is no smell because the worms are eating it.
If your worm farm smells it is probably too wet and needs to dry out or there is insufficient worms in it which can be a result of being too wet or not enough bedding for the worms to breed in. A smelly farm will attract unwanted pests and bugs. So remember plenty of bedding , not too wet but just damp and don't overfeed for the numbers of worms in your farm. Screen the whole thing every couple of months and use the castings in your garden and put the worms and bigger bit of material back in the farm and re stock the bedding.
With a stackable farm always make sure the bedding is continuous between the layers or your worms can die of starvation if the food is on top and there is a gap below.