1) I brew mine from 24-48 hours depending on temp. A good "head" on the brew is a good indication it's ready (i read this on the internet.. it MUST be true) In winter when temps are low it takes longer to brew. 2) I use 1 Tbs per gallon of water. 3) Some strain it after, some put it in cheese cloth, some use panty hose. I use a pool screen bucket with a painters net bag used for airless sprayers. To each his own. If i'm not spraying it... sometimes i just dump the VC right into the brew and stir it up every few hours. --chris

Mostly for entertainment, look at the Design an Outdoor Bin thread. This is a homemade experiment based on the Worm Factory design. Wormers with Worm Factories can add to our understanding of red wigglers by observing what the worms actually do. I've seen one ( Worm Factory) that was not watched closely. Nor had the caretaker taken much care. There were sluggish worms in the bottom tray and unappealing scraps in the food tray. There were good size pieces of egg shell too big for any critter to mouth. There was minimal bedding. For example, do the worms use the "worm ladder" ? We have a thread about worms climbing a wall . This is the manufacturer's instruction: http://www.naturesfootprint.com/community/articles/worm-factory-standard-setup I'm going to write some semi informed opinions so that we can argue about how to use the WF & I can learn how to use my outdoor bin: 1. I wouldn't use tap water to dampen paper. I'd use rainwater or aerated horse manure tea. This highlights the gap between a worm whacko and someone in an apartment with no access to some of the refinements that worms seem to like. 2. I wouldn't use unshredded newspaper as a lid. It doesn't breathe. Burlap can be bought by the yard at a fabric store if you can't get it free from a coffee roaster. Any fabric that will drain water and exchange air would be better than that newpaper lid. See the burlap effect thread. 3. I think "a handful" of food in that small tray is quite a lot, could be too much depending on what the food was. In My Experience, red wigglers like melon best of all. When I was harvesting the bin that was crowded, I put the worms that I had to pick out one by one ( they didn't go through the burlap) into a melon shell bowl. When I upturned it to dump them in the bed, they didn't drop out. They were embedded in the melon. Putting new worms on a melon shell bed might be a sweet way to go. Optimally, egg shells should be cooked (microwave a moment or two ) and powdered. Optimally, food should be pureed. 4. Density matters. Check the Please Help with Math thread to decide what the WF tray capacity for worms is. Pete read half a pound of worms per square foot. If the worms double, split the bin. I think "we/they" say the worms will eat half their weight each day. Mine have horse manure bedding and food, so I don't feed that much. I put in maybe half a cup of pureed food and don't add more until it is gone. In a WF tray, 1/4 cup might be enough. 5. Bedding. For worm health, you can't overdo good bedding. If the bin isn't very crowded, there might not be enough worm orgies to make more worms. They do crowd into a melon bowl. If you can't get horse manure, work hard on developing other optimal bedding. 6. Burlap. I wonder if the worms would like those trays better if there were a burlap lining ? Footnote: Too bad the subject isn't "Worm Factory", because the subject as phrased won't lead new readers to helpful opinions. Please phrase your subjects with newcomers in mind.

Hi Mindy, That drainage is called leachate. You can call it worm pee if you like but I doubt worms do pee, lol. That happens if the moisture from the worm food cannot be absorbed by the bedding (shredded newspaper and/or cardbard/corrugated cardboard) anymore. Which means the bin is going to the wet side. For a beginner it is better not to have a bin that is too wet because there are things that can go wrong(1)or there are things that you shouldn't have done to cause this(2). (1) the VC (vermicompost) get compacted and will not allow aeration and this in turn can cause an anaerobic condition >> stinky bin and may/will harm your worms. This is the reason some people won't use leachate. I personally use the leachate to water my outdoor plants, diluted 1:10 and in my case I haven't found any negative result. Once you are more experienced and know how to manage your bin, it is OK to have a bin that is on the wet side w/o going anaerobic. Worms DO like wet environment. You can use a breathable material to cover your bin to help with evaporation, and aeration. (2) this could be a result of too much food or food with too much water contents like tomatoes, melons and the like. Or not enough newspaper and the like. So, add more newspaper but DO NOT mix it with the food, just put it on top. Mixing them will cause the bin to heat up. If you have room in your freezer, freeze the kitchen scraps in a ziplock bag or some container for a couple of days. Many people do this to kill the fruit-fly eggs that came with the veggie or fruit. Some do this so they can drain the water once defrosted. I do not have room in my freezer and my bins are outside anyway, so I let the scraps sit for several days (pre-rotting) and drain the liquid. This is the kind of food worms like best and get processed faster. Since your bin is new, make sure you are not overfeeding them.

You can do it in the ground without a box. The worms will stay where the food is. Large scale vermicomposters will use a windrow system. I've read about a study that used bins made out of cinder block and used like a windrow. Basics are you pile your bedding on one end of a path and slowly add food to the end of the pile. You will slowly make a long path. Then you can harvest from the begining of the path without having to separate worms from castings. Then you can start a 2nd path next to the first, and the worms will naturally migrate to it for the food. I've seen in a green house where the owner kept the worm bin in ground, under his walkway. He just dug down and put cinder blocks to hold the shape. Then filled the hole with bedding and food. Easy but requires a little more work to separate the worms. Natives will come in also. You can put a tarp down to keep your worms in place, and natives out. Can't give you a size idea. Start with something about the size of a 18 gallon rubbermaid tote. Vermicompost is better than regular compost. I think I've read that it is like 10 times better, but can't find that information right now. If you have chickens, you can fee the chickens with some of your worms. You can also slowly add some of their droppings to the bedding, but not too much at a time. I'm going to give you a link to a really good pdf that someone suggested to me. It'll give you information from studies done with bedding and food types along with bins and other systems. Here is a link that might be useful: Manual of On-Farm Vermicomposting and Vermiculture By Glenn Munroe Organic Agriculture Centre of Canada