LEACHATE - Can Someone Help

10 years ago

I have been working my worm bin now for a while. I just adopted my friends. My husband and I spent 6 hrs cleaning it and getting rid of whatever she was feeding her worms and what she wanted to call compost. It was horrible. We saved as many worms as we could. We now have 2 worm bins. Healthy worm bins.

Before I started my first one, I asked around on what to do with my leachate. Everyone I asked said to get rid of it. That was the bad stuff. That is why there is a drainage bin for it and you want to separate it from the worms and the compost. So when it drained out of the drainage bin, it drained into a pint jar and when that jar got full, I would always flush it down the toilet. We have a septic. I don't know if it is just coincidence or not, but the grass where the septic tank is has been getting very green and full since I have been doing that.

This year I will be getting my first greenhouse and I will be putting a vertical hydroponic system in it. I will have a water tank hooked up to that. I don't know if it would be safe to use the leachate in the water for the hydroponic system and if it is, how much would I use for every 5 gallons of water?

Can anyone help me on this???

Is this also safe to store until I use it - maybe in a freezer, or under the house where it may freeze depending on how cold it got?

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Comments (6)

mendopete
10 years ago
Hi renowormgirl, welcome to the forum!

I would guess you have stackable bin systems with a drainage bin at the bottom. Generally, you should strive to have little or no leatchate. This is accomplished by adding LOTS of dry bedding with your feedings.

There are mixed opinions on using leachate on your garden. Some dilute it and use, and some dump it. Many others add dry bedding to the catch-basin to absorb the moisture. This damp bedding is then added to the top bin and the process is repeated.

Your leachate will not be so "toxic" that it needs to go down the toilet! The problem with it is that it can vary in composition depending feedstocks. It will also go anaerobic stored in a jar.

For your hydroponic system, how about brewing fresh aerobic vermicompost tea out of your castings? Some people combine their worm system and their hydroponic system to create a vermiponics system.

Good luck with your worm adventure! Pete
dadugriff
10 years ago
During spring and summer, I make aerated compost tea in a 55 gallon drum and use it to water the garden. I get some leachate from time to time and will most likely dump it into the drum. This year I will be using some of the vermicompost as well. All the left over sludge will go on the compost pile and then back to the worms. I add a cup of sugar and a handful of dry cat food to the ACT drum to feed the wee beasties. It brews for a day or two until it's good and foamy. A pump and a hose get it to the garden. This has been working for a couple of years now with no problems that I have seen. This year I will have a couple hundred pounds of VC to spread around as well. I really don't know if my science is all correct, I just keep adding to the system and so far it is working. But, back to the leachate. I believe that my aerated drum will take care of any anaerobic problems and still multiply any good organisms in a small amount of leachate. Like the rest of my system, I'll find out eventually. Live and learn!
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I believe I am the one who stated "compost tea." ... but I do not have a "WF." Rather, I have several barrels that are watered by gutter rain and fed with kitchen and garden scraps, as well as chicken poo. At the bottom of the barrel there are several spouts that feed into holding containers. The water that drains through to the holding tank is what I refer to as "compost tea." I use this directly on plants without diluting, and have had only marvelous results. As for the smaller tubs of concentrated redwigglers -- I use the large Wal-Mart totes that held items sent to the thrift store. Stacking two, three, four, or more depending on the amount of worms and accumulated castings. On the very bottom is a solid tote with holes in the lid which holds anything that drains through the top bins. I equipped the bottom bin with old spouts from large detergent containers to dispense the liquid as needed. This liquid...I have no name for it. It is sometimes there, sometimes not, and sometimes I drain water all of the way through to have a bit of concentrated liquid. The concentrated liquid I use on my open-air compost piles or throw in the Compost Tumbler to heat up the compost. But if you have an indoor worm bin, which I believe a "WF" is...I wouldn't want water on the bottom. When my indoor worms (meals and supers) get too wet I think I am seeing spots...then I realize fruit flies are multiplying like crazy. Then it's off to the big-box for some apple cider vinegar and some Damp-Rid. :)
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Yes we started with a lot of worms. We generate about 6lbs of kitchen waste a week according to my husband. In the past 6 months (we just moved to N. Mexico last fall), we've been putting this, together with a lot of animal poop plus garden greens and browns, into the big compost bin. So far we have about a volume of 4' x 4' x 3' of compostable stuff which is decaying very slowly. Our hope is to add worms to the big bin some time when it's cooler. Then we'll keep a smaller population in the rubbermaid bins, feeding it on the kitchen waste. I don't know how the worms will do in the big compost pile. This is all an experiment to try to speed up the rate of composting. At the rate we generate compostables, the big bin would overflow in a few months. My concern isn't too many worms, not for a while. I assume that if the population in the big bin is too large, the worms will escape and be eaten by the birds. We are adding bedding, mostly damp cardboard and some paper, regularly and keeping everything covered with bedding. I assume the lack of any leachate means I'm not overdoing the food. I don't have room to freeze or blend the kitchen waste, it's too much volume and mess. I hope the week or so in the outside bucket starts the decomposition process. The next hurdle is harvesting. I need to think on this - I'm still too squeamish to handle the worms with my hands. But the garden desperately needs organic matter and nutrients, so I'm looking forward to the proceeds of my worm colony.
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I have read some people put dry shredded cardboard in the bottom catch-basin. This soaks up the juice and give wayward worms a place of refuge. You can then put the wet bedding and worms into the system Hope this helps. Good luck, Pete
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Sam - What sacrilege!!! LOL Having 2 roses of the same type. LOL Yeah, having more than one type would be beautiful in landscaping, but I gotta have as many different types of roses as possible. I just gotta. :) Jim - seems like my soil DOES have all the microbrial good stuff in it. Apparently for potted soils, the place I use, just adds sand to the garden soil, and calls it potting soil (which is what I use). See below: The BigYellowBag® made its first appearance in Southwestern Ontario. Since then, it has been making its way across Canada and the United States! When it comes to getting our ‘stock’ of soil, we don’t just go with the closest or cheapest suppliers. We search out the best quality soil and stock it, sometimes for years in advance, to make certain we can consistently offer the highest quality of soil to our customers. Different types of soil have different levels of nutrients. One will have more phosphorus, another more nitrogen, and so on. Using third-party laboratories and professional agronomists, we test the soils we’re purchasing from our suppliers to determine the quality of these levels. Once we know the properties of the soils, we blend them to create a perfect balance that offers the best level of nutrients, minerals and soil texture to stimulate plant growth. After we’ve mixed the soil, we screen it several times, making sure that there aren’t any stones or clumps in the blend. Then we get it tested again to make sure that our Black Garden Soil’s nutritional properties fall within optimal ranges. We all know the saying “you are what you eat,” and we want to make sure your garden or lawn is getting the best ‘food’ possible from our Black Garden Soil. Quality Active Soil Does Make A Difference! Soil is home to many living things and has an important job to do for the environment. It’s full of organisms, mineral and organic matter and provides moisture, air and nutrients. A good quality soil is a vibrant mix loaded with microscopic life containing good bacteria and beneficial funghi; which help the soil cycle nutrients, decompose, help hold the soil together and improve soil structure. BigYellowBag& Black Garden Soil is comprised of a combination of black loam, peat loam, very-well-decomposed manure and a touch of mineral soil. These ingredients encourage microbial activity, which aid in plant growth. This soil is specially blended to enrich and balance the local soil conditions found in each BigYellowBag® area. Approximately one cubic yard in size, the bags can yield enough soil for the average home’s use. ------------------- So I conclude that my soil should be just like garden soil. I guess. So I'm going to continue using worm compost, but I'm going to use Straw's magic recipe. I'm quite excited about the change of using gypsum, etc. I'll let you all know if it's made a difference. Thanks for all of your fantastic advice. Carol
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boreal_wormer
10 years ago
renowormgirl you originally posted your question by accident in the Cocoa Shells & Vermicomposting thread.

http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/verm/msg0211524225725.html?31820

Could you go edit that post to say something like oops. You'll see the "NEW! Edit Post" link near the top of your post.

Thanks
11otis
10 years ago
Definitely no freezing. It will just kill whatever good it may contain. I do not use leachate for my indoor plants, but use it for outdoors, either diluted or not, around my Rhododendron bushes away from the stem. My thinking, they are establish plants and not easy to kill if there is anything wrong with it, rather than tossing it down the toilet.
vislander
10 years ago
I have one flow-through bin and 1 15 year old bin that's a rubber horse watering trough, tilted about 2 or 3 degrees with a hose bib on the lower end.
I have it high enough so a 5 gallon bucket sits under the hose bib. I use a aquarium pump to aerate the leachate that drains out of the bin, which I water heavily quite often, and it kills all the anaerobic bacteria in the leachate.
I sprinkle blood meal and bone meal on top of the bin and always keep 6" of shredded cardboard on top. I then empty the 5 gallon bucket into a 55 gallon drum and aerate it as well. Add a little fish emulsion with nitrogen and some 0-5-5 fish fertilizer.
This is excellent for spraying the leaves of ailing plants if you add clear dish soap and it makes a great straight fertilizer.
I also add all of my organic kitchen waste to each bin.
The flow-through bin has a 45 degree tilted board under the bottom where the flow through VC and some worms come through. It has a deep enough border of 2 X 6's that I drain with a 1" PVC pipe that leads to the 5 gallon bucket. I water this quite heavily and the finished CV slides down the board and stays wet enough to harbor any worms that may come through the bottom mesh and I keep the area around the pipe clean and a screen over the top of the 5 gal bucket and leave the worms pretty much alone.
Every 6 months I empty the 1/2 the rubber bin, then spread what's left on the bottom and start over again.
Worm bins are a great place to propagate seeds and plants as well.
chuckiebtoo
10 years ago
Leachate is a good thing to put on plants. It is basically watered-down, benign vermi-matter and composting materials that are teeming with bacterial activity....all good...that will absolutely NOT harm anything you put it on.

It is basically a pretty mild tea concoction that will benefit your plants.

Chuckiebtoo

LEACHATE - Can Someone Help

Comments (6)

mendopete

dadugriff

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