composting worms

[tulip]

For years I froze my kitchen scraps in order to eliminate the stink that accompanied the collection. Now, however, I use a stainless steel bucket with a tight fitting lid. I take it out to my compost bin every couple of days. I've had no problems with stink or flies.

I'm a long-time composter, and I'm excited to get my 3-bin system up and running in May at my new house. Right now I have just a big pile of leaves (I have five mature oak trees in my yard) and my black composter. No problems with rodents here, but I did have a terrible problem with rats when I lived near DC. The only way to keep them away was to turn the pile every few days so they couldn't settle in. But that was hard to do with my work schedule. I would consider worms if I didn't have a yard.

[OakLeaf]

My "inside" scrap bucket is a one-gallon plastic container with a snap lid and a carry handle from the paint department at Home Depot. It goes in the dishwasher when it gets too gross.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

I've only had a problem with fruit flies with citrus fruits, so eventually I just stopped adding those to my bin. However, I'm interested in the freezing technique... I hate not being able to compost everything.
(Burying them deeper didn't fix the problem for me.)

They say if you lay several inches of fresh dry shredded newspaper on the very TOP of the surface of the composting bed with the worms, it keeps most of the fruit flies from getting down in the damp food stuff to lay any eggs. Between that and the freezing should help.

My worms have not arrived yet, but any day now, certainly this week. Meanwhile, I keep a little open plastic box for kitchen scraps near the sink, and after two or three days i put the lid on and freeze it and start a new tub near the sink. Then I'll thaw the frozen scraps to room temp a batch at a time and bury them in the worm bin once it's set up.
I read that freezing food scraps and then thawing them helps 'break them down' right away to the stage where the worms will be able to eat them much more quickly than if they were just fresh scraps. That makes sense to me.

Right now I have just a big pile of leaves (I have five mature oak trees in my yard) and my black composter. No problems with rodents here, but I did have a terrible problem with rats when I lived near DC. The only way to keep them away was to turn the pile every few days so they couldn't settle in. But that was hard to do with my work schedule. I would consider worms if I didn't have a yard.

I do have a yard, but I don't have that much yard debris to compost- mostly I've been frustrated as to 'recycling' kitchen food scraps. Here there are too many possums, skunks, racoons, dogs (and yes a few country rats too) to be putting food scraps into an outdoor bin. Those animals can pry their way into anything!
But I liked the idea of a worm bin...it seems much more efficient and elegant to handle our limited food scraps. I like the concept of letting the worms do the 'turning' of the compost. Besides, worm castings will be GREAT fertilizer for my tomatoes!

[deedolce]

I love wormies! I got a worm tower through Freecycle, and got started with worms from a team member, trading her some handspun yarn for worms. I freeze stuff too. I also get used coffee grounds from the local Starbucks for the regular compost and my worm bin. I started 3 soda pop worm towers for my classroom too...science project, of course!

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

My first package of composting worms has arrived!
They are in their temporary bin home until their 'fancy' worm hive comes tomorrow.
I posted a bunch of worm pictures here:
My Blog
....Cute story included about my mailman, too.

[Dianyla]

They say if you lay several inches of fresh dry shredded newspaper on the very TOP of the surface of the composting bed with the worms, it keeps most of the fruit flies from getting down in the damp food stuff to lay any eggs.

That probably would help. However, in smaller bins, especially the tray systems, the height of each tray is about 6". As it starts getting full and ready to jump to the next tray, there's absolutely no room for that much additional material added on top. One thing I did try was to lay several sheets of newspaper down around the entire tray, to "seal" the top of the active pile from flies. Didn't work. The only thing that worked was to stop putting in citrus peels.

I read that freezing food scraps and then thawing them helps 'break them down' right away to the stage where the worms will be able to eat them much more quickly than if they were just fresh scraps. That makes sense to me.

That should help make the nutrients more readily available to the worms. When processing vegetables/etc. in the kitchen I always make sure to chop the rinds into smaller pieces. Also, I've also found it's a lot better to feed them in batches. I'll collect a pailful of my own kitchen scraps, and consolidate my scraps with a friend's kitchen scraps. By the time I take it down to the worms (about every 2 weeks) it's getting pretty ripe already. But the worms seem to love partially rotted scraps more than absolutely fresh cuttings.

Also, staggering the feedings forces them to eat some of their less favorite foods, otherwise they'll continue to avoid less favored foods and head for the choice items every time.