Vermicomposting ignorance; building a stack from conical buckets
Posted: Fri May 05, 2017 2:33 pm
The local recycling station gave away red wigglers last weekend so I've been trying to figure out how to make the best of it.
I'm looking at vermicomposting and regular-pile-composting to add to what will soon become a square meter garden.
Worms can't eat all the grass leaves, branch clippings and crud from our household so we'll probably feed the worms as much as possible and toss the rest on the compost pile. I've been told that the two kinds of composting supplement each other very well, so until I hear otherwise that's probably what we're gonna do.
In regards to vermicomposting: There are a lot of checklists and not very many experts on the internet, which I find kind of frustrating. I don't do checklists very well.
The setup I'm most inclined towards is a propped-up drain bucket with a cheap spigot at the bottom of the stack, then the worm-and-bedding-and-food-scraps bucket in the middle, and new food stuffs in the top bucket. Then I'll make a lid from plywood if I can't find some cheap 20L buckets that come with lids. It seems like it's very easy to harvest castings if you do the three-bucket system and you can always add more buckets in case your worm population is thriving or you need to dispose more waste.
It seems like 20L buckets are the way to go in regards to volume and I can get three or five of those very cheaply.
But stacking is an issue with the kinds of buckets I have access to!
How deep will the worms burrow and how tightly can I stack the bucket? Can I place a new bucket with fresh scraps directly on top of the bedding in the middle bucket without crushing the entire system or do I need to fancy some sort of system that keeps the topmost bucket from resting directly on the scraps and bedding from the middle bucket?
Since buckets are conical and not cylindrical there will be a gap between the buckets when one rests on top of another one that isn't completely empty. If I do simply stack the buckets, do I need some sort of seal between the middle bucket and the top bucket so the middle bucket is totally in the dark or is it fine if there is a rim of light at the edges?
Fo' real dudes it looks like non-European buckets are made to be stacked ineffeciently with space to spare on the bottom, just like these: http://cdn2.playdoughtoplato.com/wp-con ... C_4012.jpg and European buckets are made to preserve as much space as possible like these: http://www.harald-nyborg.dk/images/800/23006.jpg which will leave only a few millimeters of space on the bottom when stacked.
I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.
So: to sum up.
1) Is a homemade plywood lid just fine?
2) How much space can there be between bucket sides when the middle one is packed with bedding and worms (and the bottom one probably has tea in it so that one will need some sort of spacing too.
I'm looking at vermicomposting and regular-pile-composting to add to what will soon become a square meter garden.
Worms can't eat all the grass leaves, branch clippings and crud from our household so we'll probably feed the worms as much as possible and toss the rest on the compost pile. I've been told that the two kinds of composting supplement each other very well, so until I hear otherwise that's probably what we're gonna do.
In regards to vermicomposting: There are a lot of checklists and not very many experts on the internet, which I find kind of frustrating. I don't do checklists very well.
The setup I'm most inclined towards is a propped-up drain bucket with a cheap spigot at the bottom of the stack, then the worm-and-bedding-and-food-scraps bucket in the middle, and new food stuffs in the top bucket. Then I'll make a lid from plywood if I can't find some cheap 20L buckets that come with lids. It seems like it's very easy to harvest castings if you do the three-bucket system and you can always add more buckets in case your worm population is thriving or you need to dispose more waste.
It seems like 20L buckets are the way to go in regards to volume and I can get three or five of those very cheaply.
But stacking is an issue with the kinds of buckets I have access to!
How deep will the worms burrow and how tightly can I stack the bucket? Can I place a new bucket with fresh scraps directly on top of the bedding in the middle bucket without crushing the entire system or do I need to fancy some sort of system that keeps the topmost bucket from resting directly on the scraps and bedding from the middle bucket?
Since buckets are conical and not cylindrical there will be a gap between the buckets when one rests on top of another one that isn't completely empty. If I do simply stack the buckets, do I need some sort of seal between the middle bucket and the top bucket so the middle bucket is totally in the dark or is it fine if there is a rim of light at the edges?
Fo' real dudes it looks like non-European buckets are made to be stacked ineffeciently with space to spare on the bottom, just like these: http://cdn2.playdoughtoplato.com/wp-con ... C_4012.jpg and European buckets are made to preserve as much space as possible like these: http://www.harald-nyborg.dk/images/800/23006.jpg which will leave only a few millimeters of space on the bottom when stacked.
I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.
So: to sum up.
1) Is a homemade plywood lid just fine?
2) How much space can there be between bucket sides when the middle one is packed with bedding and worms (and the bottom one probably has tea in it so that one will need some sort of spacing too.