“LONG post. Looking for advice from folks who have lots of experience with medium scale worm breeding and casting production” Most of us here do smaller scale. “I can already tell that much of the advice out there is like the advice on regular composting - easiest case advice that has been reprinted enough times that certain things become 'consensus' thus must be true.” The same thing happens here. Since you are asking questions about things we may not have experience with, expect more of that kind of advice. “the advice out there that says a worm population will double in 90 days is silly - under ideal conditions they could increase 100 fold in that time period.” The WEIGHT of the worm population can double every 90 days. The numbers will more than double, but many of the new worms will be babies. “My assumption is that the fastest way to get a large population going is to master the right conditions and then to have very low density. IE, a pound of worms in one bin is not going to yield the same population in three months as will the same pound of worms spread across 2,4, or 8 bins.” I have no idea how you come to that conclusion. Worms only breed so fast. Separating them from potential partners does not speed up the process. You want to avoid overcrowding the worms, but one pound in the kind of bin you describe is far from overcrowding. “Is there a minimum number you experienced breeders have found to be the minimum effective dose to ensure worms are finding one another and doing the horizontal worm mambo” Two. “or have these suckers been around a few million years because if there are two they will track one another down and ensure the survival of the species?” I don’t know if anyone here has really researched that, but conventional wisdom says that if your population is not dense enough, you will have less breeding. “For Bins, I am building continuous flow through bins using plastic garbage pails since they are cheap and large.” But are not strong enough to hold the weight of the VC, especially if you have cut a hole in the bottom large enough to facilitate harvesting. Bins made the way you describe tend to collapse under the weight of the VC “I figured the cranked spinning bar would likely just dig a groove above the grate and require some hand loosening anyway” That has been my experience. “I was thinking I'd use 'unfinished' hot compost. By unfinished, I mean it has been turned a couple times and there are still identifiable chunks like leaves that are blackened but largely whole.” This would make great bedding. If your hot compost has a balance of C to N, it would also be great food, and would require no additional food. “Am I right that unfinished compost, so long as it doesn't heat up is more or less perfect and would spur breeding since it would represent a mountain of perfect food source and stay pretty constant in terms of temp and moisture level with minimal effort?” Probably. “Food: I will quickly have more worms than I will have food scraps suitable for feeding them,” You are being optimistic. You may be right, but there can be a lot of surprises when you are raising live animals. “One of my favorite composting ingredients is to get coffee grounds in mass quantity from the coffee shops” This is not ideal worm food. Perhaps you would do better to put it in your hot bins and precompost it. “I have read that too many coffee grounds are bad for worms due to acidity.” A lot of people say that. I don’t buy it. “Is there another reason they would be bad?” Besides that worms don’t like to eat them until they have decomposed a bit? “I don't want to make feeding the worms a full time job so if I get sufficient numbers I know a nursery that will sell a truckload of horse stall compost cheap.” That may be the answer to getting them to breed faster as well. “It's a tad warm usually but I'm thinking that spreading an inch on top of the bins and lightly watering it would prevent heating and I've read that there is no better food for feeding compost worms and getting them to breed/mature quickly?” Correct, and correct.

Was wondering about that too. You can insert stumped fabric onto bobbin or tatted lace. It still doesn't look crocheted to me. My crochet skills were never good enough to even consider making doilies or lace, but there is some needlework going on in the pattern not from a crochet hook. Could be really old or imported lace somebody wanted to salvage, but an apron would be the last place I'd want to splurge with a treasure like that, given it would be used and laundered often. That's another reason I suggested it may be tatted, as it's sewn onto the cloth with a needle, and it was just a common art in the depression era and some tatted work does not look anything like what you'd expect. It was at one time a way to make fishing nets, and open lattice is not at all uncommon. But, I'm not arguing that view at all, just holding open the thought it just doesn't strike me as being typically crocheted either.

Thanks, guys! I've had a lot of fun with this technique. I've exhibited some, and given a couple away as baby gifts. They make nice wall decor for a nursery. The colors are determined by the background you choose. Mel, here are the instructions I used. Oil on Water Photographs I've seen some good results using gift wrap as the background. I paint my backgrounds on foam core. I recommend taking the pictures outdoors in bright sun. The process can be messy if you have a spill, so I'd rather not do it in the house. If you try this, anyone, please share your results!

Wow... Your kitchen is already beautiful. I can understand wanting to make it your own, but just have to say it looks as good as many of the finished kitchens on here. Good to be planning this far ahead! Will the layout change at all or does it work well for you now? As far as picture size, I had to ask this question just last week. I found how to resize them automatically when I downloaded and couldn't remember how to change that option. But now I know. If you go to your upload page and see where it says "more options" in blue right under "Upload now", it gives you the option of choosing the download size. I had medium but have changed to large, and it is much better. I think you can make them smaller but not larger, so you may have to upload them again. Opinions only: 1. Ask your contractor what is the tallest window you could get. That would be my vote... as far down to the counter and as far up to the ceiling as he will allow. (I have an 8' span of windows, two double casements... love them, and wish I could have more. GC allowed me 42" high for my 8' ceilings. I love how easy it is to open them. Caveat -- I have cats, and though they are not supposed to get on the counters, they do, and at night when the bugs come to the windows, they attack the screens, which are on the inside for casements. Didn't think about that until the screens went in. You should be OK with dogs unless they get on the counters to get at the bugs.) Agree with chicagoans on the molding ... yes. Screens, yes, depending on where you are. Will you open the windows a lot? Do you have bugs? (I just reread and saw that I agreed with chicagoans on the other questions too, just missed that fact. : ) ) 2. ? Not sure what your question was. 3. Here are some sinks with low dividers. Sorry, I don't have time to make active links for them, but you can just triple click to highlight, then command/control C, then control V in your empty or highlighted browser. http://www.us.kohler.com/onlinecatalog/detail.jsp?prod_num=5838%2D7U http://www.elkayusa.com/cps/rde/xchg/elkay/hs.xsl/elkay-res-16192.aspx http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/load/kitchbath/msg0919032530825.html