Consistency of vermicompost

MistaRasta

Well-Known Member
Hey guys/girls, have a question about vermicompost..

So I just found a local source of some vermicompost. I noticed the consistency of these castings were almost the same as peat, theyre kind of fluffy But very dark.

Is this how vermicompost is supposed to be?

I always imagined it to be thick chunks of muddy goodness. This stuff looks/feels mainly like peat..

It looks very dark and rich. I just don't know as I've never dealt with vermicompost.

I'll be making my own soon, had to mix up my soil ASAP as I run a perpetual.

Thanks guys
 

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
Hey guys/girls, have a question about vermicompost..

So I just found a local source of some vermicompost. I noticed the consistency of these castings were almost the same as peat, theyre kind of fluffy But very dark.

Is this how vermicompost is supposed to be?

I always imagined it to be thick chunks of muddy goodness. This stuff looks/feels mainly like peat..

It looks very dark and rich. I just don't know as I've never dealt with vermicompost.

I'll be making my own soon, had to mix up my soil ASAP as I run a perpetual.

Thanks guys
need pics to say for sure, but if they are sifted, it'll be fluffy, and it also is dependent on the micro size of the filter too.
My DIY vermicompost sifter does a good job getting it nice and fluffy, but not really like peat though, it's solid. Worm shit consistency is like mud.. sorta, just thousands of tiny specks of mud..
Should be pretty much black, and should "wad" up when you make a fist with it. Almost like clay sorta
 

st0wandgrow

Well-Known Member
Hey guys/girls, have a question about vermicompost..

So I just found a local source of some vermicompost. I noticed the consistency of these castings were almost the same as peat, theyre kind of fluffy But very dark.

Is this how vermicompost is supposed to be?

I always imagined it to be thick chunks of muddy goodness. This stuff looks/feels mainly like peat..

It looks very dark and rich. I just don't know as I've never dealt with vermicompost.

I'll be making my own soon, had to mix up my soil ASAP as I run a perpetual.

Thanks guys
If it's fully finished castings it will look almost like coffee grounds. If it's un-screened vermicompost it will have larger chunks/bits in it.

What you really want to be careful of is that you aren't being sold black peat moss. It looks very similar to castings, but it's just peat moss. It wouldn't hurt your soil per se, but it will be almost completely devoid of beneficial microbes.

Black peat moss:



Worm castings:

 

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
If it's fully finished castings it will look almost like coffee grounds. If it's un-screened vermicompost it will have larger chunks/bits in it.

What you really want to be careful of is that you aren't being sold black peat moss. It looks very similar to castings, but it's just peat moss. It wouldn't hurt your soil per se, but it will be almost completely devoid of beneficial microbes.



Worm castings:

mmmmmm, I can smell it!
 

MistaRasta

Well-Known Member
@greasemonkeymann and
@stowandgrow

Thanks guys. I definitely bought some black peat moss.i mean this stuff is nothing... I'll definitely be checking bags before I buy from now on.

That's if I buy bags of anything at all.


Going to start making my own soon. What's a realistic amount on castings you guys think I would get if I were to harvest a 15 gallon smart pot each month? I know their is a lot of factors just looking for an estimate.
 

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
@greasemonkeymann and
@stowandgrow

Thanks guys. I definitely bought some black peat moss.i mean this stuff is nothing... I'll definitely be checking bags before I buy from now on.

That's if I buy bags of anything at all.


Going to start making my own soon. What's a realistic amount on castings you guys think I would get if I were to harvest a 15 gallon smart pot each month? I know their is a lot of factors just looking for an estimate.
i'm not sure I understand the question exactly...
Are you asking if you had a 15 gal smartpot that you have as a wormbin?
And don't expect anything for the first 45 days or so at least, unless you buy a large amount of worms to begin with.
If you want to accelerate your progress, and can afford fifty bucks or so you can get an asston of worms (uncle jims), and then you'll be harvesting in about 30 days or so...
I'd go with a 25 gallon smartpot, a bunch of shredded, soaked cardboard or newspaper, some like peat as a base, personally I threw an extremely rootbound 1 gallon rootball in mine, and added a bunch of soaked & shredded cardboard, about a 4-5 days or so, the worms will be acclimated and ready for some food.
Fill the pot about 1/3 way, to allow you to add stuff as you go, you may want to buy an extra coffee grinder or mortar & pestle to grind up some eggshells for your worms, this does two things, it adds a good amount of calcium to your vermicastings, and also helps the worms digest their food.
but like everything, don't overdo it.
my method is pretty simple, I freeze the leftover fruit & scraps, I have found that the worms have their "favorites" meaning the stuff they consume within hrs, those include pears, melons, apples, grapes, tomatoes. Freeze them all, for a day or longer, and then thaw in a plastic bag, sealed. I like to allow the mushy thawed fruit to go bad for a day or so, then mash it up inside the bag, mash it to a slushy plop, no mess, no fuss, then dig a hole in your wormbin, about a fist size, and plop the fruit/vege mash in it and cover with the dirt you dug out, no smell, no run off, I don't water my worm bin unless it gets super hot, the moisture from the fruit is enough. I keep my bin outside but I literally could keep it inside with no issues, no flies, no stink or anything.
After like an hr or so, if you are curious, uncover the fruit and you'll see a writhing mass of redworms the size of your hand or bigger, they go NUTS over it.
Ah, and I do like to either rinse out the plastic "mush" bag, or toss it, either way, it works well if you shop at a grocery store that has good produce bags then you can just use whatever you bought the fruit in.
Things I have used for food that I don't recommend are the following.
banana peels, they take too long to breakdown, and the worms don't like em, possible pesticides too, even organics
kale, smells literally like a rotting animal, not recommended. I'd smell a fish emulsion tea that's been anerobic for days over composting kale...
celery, too fibrous for them to breakdown readily.
avocado seeds, or peels, they LOVE the actual avocado though! Like crazy, but not the seeds or peels.
my worms can destroy an entire large pear in about 6 hrs. BUT, I do give them a day break between feeding, when it's cold I feed them once a week.
Oh, another thing, my worms don't like coffee grinds, thats the most common "worm-food" for wormbins, and mine take SO long to eat them, so I use my grind as a nitrogen additive for my compost pile, works awesome in that regard, compared to fruit though the coffee takes a week or so to consume, the fruit takes hrs, plus I speculate that a fruit based vermicast may be higher in phosphorus, which is always a good thing.
waste not.
Ok, thus concludes this coffee/black tea fueled rant. Whew.
 

gilbsy123

Well-Known Member
How many lbs of worms you have @greasemonkeyman? Sounds like you've got your bin petty well dialed in.

How are the castings, big and fluffy, like coffee grounds or more fine like fine sand?
 

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
How many lbs of worms you have @greasemonkeyman? Sounds like you've got your bin petty well dialed in.

How are the castings, big and fluffy, like coffee grounds or more fine like fine sand?
shit, impossible to tell now, those little guys/girls procreate like mad, I can tell you my entire smartpot is FULL of them, if you even move a speck of anything of the top you'll see dozens of all kinds of shapes and sizes of them, and cocoons as well.
I know that I produce more castings than I use, and I only have one smartpot.
I could probably sift out a good cubic foot or so, right now.
well.. in a couple hrs or so.
--side note-- I did a thread regarding the harvesting of the castings a lil while ago, an easy DIY pleastic needlepoint tube that filters even the cocoons out and is nothing but pure light fluffy vermicastings.
To answer your question, the moisture and filter size will dictate what the consistency of the casts
 

gilbsy123

Well-Known Member
I imagine they do, but it won't matter, the screen size I use is fine for that, they key is you don't want to screen your vermicast when its wet... doesn't work.
if it's moist but not "muddy" it'll go through the screen perfectly.
heres a link
https://www.rollitup.org/t/excellent-way-to-harvest-homemade-ewc.863032/#post-11404918
Ok. I just have found what I thought were the castings to be little granules. They got bigger when I fed chicken feed to the worms. I have also noticed small piles of castings out in the yard after it rains which are from bigger worms and they are even bigger than the corn fed red worms.

I didn't realize that the screen and moisture shaped them, I thought it was from their digestive system.
 

gilbsy123

Well-Known Member
I checked out that harvester you made grease, it seems pretty handy.

The reason I'm questioning the castings you speak of is because I noticed that the castings I was sifting also looked an awful lot like peat moss as the op mentioned.

I may have not had my worms working long enough, or some other detail I may have over looked in the whole process. My plants that received the castings did get darker green like I wanted so whatever was in them did some good for my girls.
 

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
I checked out that harvester you made grease, it seems pretty handy.

The reason I'm questioning the castings you speak of is because I noticed that the castings I was sifting also looked an awful lot like peat moss as the op mentioned.

I may have not had my worms working long enough, or some other detail I may have over looked in the whole process. My plants that received the castings did get darker green like I wanted so whatever was in them did some good for my girls.
if you didn't add a bunch of peat to begin with I can't imagine it being peat, how long have you had the worms?
 

greasemonkeymann

Well-Known Member
Ok. I just have found what I thought were the castings to be little granules. They got bigger when I fed chicken feed to the worms. I have also noticed small piles of castings out in the yard after it rains which are from bigger worms and they are even bigger than the corn fed red worms.

I didn't realize that the screen and moisture shaped them, I thought it was from their digestive system.
yeah, those are earthworm castings, different animal, much bigger than normal reds.
and they eat different stuff too, probably why it looks different as well.
my bin is full of both, the earthworms will pile their casting on the surface, and the reds will simply make castings where their food is.
 
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