I am a little south of you in north county San Diego. Last year was my first year with container vegetables. I have full sun and lots of drying wind all day long. I had excellent results with summer squash. No matter what I do in the garden, squash wilts mid day. In the container garden there was no wilting and high production. Very good success with basil and broccoli. Bell peppers were good but some of the garden peppers did better. Same for tomatoes. Bigger pots do better as they hold more water. i water about once a day. The squash was in 20 gal pots which seems adequate. Some squash in #15 (12 gal) did ok. #15 for tomatoes seemed too small. 25 gal for tomatoes was ok but I want bigger. For smaller plants it is ok but I am trying 40 gal for bigger plants this year. Basil did fine in 5 gal pots. However You can't leave for a day or two unwatered so bigger is better. This year I am going to get saucers for watering if I have to leave them for a couple of days. Saucers for the 20 gal and up is more difficult I may try to make my own with concrete. I like the Earth Gro ground cover bark at Home Depot. Batches vary a lot. Sometimes it is good, sometimes not so good. My biggest mistake last year was not enough nitrogen. The bark eats it up. I mix about eight parts bark, one peat, one Kellogs Amend (composted poultry manure, rice hulls, gypsum and etc.) and one part calcined clay (kitty litter) I add Vigoro citrus and avocado fert (has some micros and slow release nitrogen), gypsum,epsom salt and dolomite lime and a little Am nitrate to the upper half of the containers. I use black nursery pots because they are the cheapest pots I can find. Twelve bucks for 25 gal and 22 bucks for a forty. Zeuspaul

It sounds like a cool book. I will have to look for it.

First of all, thanks for all the replies. :=) The COW sits on a north terrace against a wall, so it basically doesn't get any sun. I feed what I get from the kitchen scraps (like melon peels or banana skins, scraps from onions, plums, apples, salad, etc.) plus the leaves and weeds that accumulate on the terrace. I live in Central Europe, so yes, winter will be coming. (Speaking of which: I do have an unheated basement which seems perfect if it gets too cold outside, but I don't want to introduce flies and vermin to the room. Any advice - e.g. "stop adding to the bin starting November" - to keep that from happening?) The worms I had I got from a live garden compost heap. I'm fairly sure that, at least as far as the worms are concerned, things went well in the beginning, because the tap water from underneath always contained a couple of living baby worms that fell down from above. As for the moskitos, I am assuming that the water from underneath probably hit the bottom of the first tray at some point. In the meantime I know that it's actually best to either keep the tap open, or to at least empty the sink frequently. (Reason I made that mistake is simple - when there's so much rain that the bottom sink fills up, there's obviously no need for me to use that water for manual irrigation. ;) Current conditions: I've noticed that the soil at the bottom of the sink seems very compact, almost like clay. This could be due to water hitting that area (months ago!), or also maybe because of the ants I had, who tend to break up soil into tiny bits. When I take soil from the bottom into my hands, I can squeeze a couple of drops out of it, so it's fairly wet, but I wouldn't call it completely soaked. What would worm cocoons look like? Can I see them, or are they too small? I would expect them to hatch if conditions are fine, so if they don't hatch, can I conclude that I still need to change the conditions for that to happen? I've heard about the paper and cardboard thing, so in the meantime, I'm adding that as well. Just not sure about the effect, because sometimes I wonder if the paper doesn't actually *store* water and therefore contributes to keeping the whole system wet, rather than dry. Moving the COW under cover is something I've thought about as well - I just wouldn't know where or how. So up to now, keeping the bottom pan empty, adding paper and putting the T-shirt on top are the most important changes I made over time. Problem is, I don't know if the changes aren't enough, or if they just came too late. If I knew for certain that there's simply too much water coming in from the top, I'd probably buy a small plastic table and move the bin underneath. The bulk of flies is really just fruit flies - many thousands of them. Other sorts of flies as well, but not the fat ones. ;) Seems to me like I don't only need to learn about what worms like, but also about what flies, moskitos and ants like (in order to NOT give it to them). For example, I'm assuming that my scraps may already be catching a couple of fruit flies in the kitchen, and then, when I add those scraps to the bin, I'm increasing the fruit fly population. So maybe I need to keep my scraps more or less sterile, in an airtight container, before they go into the bin. What exactly do you guys mean by "bedding"? I thought that's what you start out with, but which the worms munch up in a couple of weeks/months? Thanks again!

Donna- These are great ideas! Creative use for old t-shirts and for white wall board. Any teacher would love these practical gifts. Thanks for sharing the details on how to make them. -Laurie