Andy asked 6 years ago
G’day,
I have the 3 tray Worm cafe and successfully operated it for 2 years with a hessian sack cover over the beds, all without any issues although the mixed population changed over time to just tigers mainly. They used to like coming up onto the inside of the lid in large numbers. Last September over a month or so the worms progressively decreased in population, with only a few languishing tiredly in the bottom drain tray. Although I rarely watered them the lowest castings tray looked extremely wet and even the top tray seemed wetter than it should, so maybe oxygen was a problem. I obtained a new batch of fresh mixed species worms, reworked the compost castings in all trays to a drier, but still damp, consistency with coir and straw. Initially the worms thrived, but after two months they started to decline again, and now almost none appear on the top bedding. I have not been watering as the bedding seems to be damp enough as it is. I don’t feed anything rubbish, mainly tea leaves and veggie scraps, some banana peel and passionfruit rind, which they love. But they’ve stopped attacking these and retreated. Again, the beds seem wetter and more congealed than looks good, although the odor is fine – no sourness at all. No mites either, just a few slater-like looking insects.So I’ve re-aerated the beds in both used trays with fresh coir and brown dried grass and bamboo leaves. The bedding looks great and smells really fresh. The worms again in the drain tray look tired. Not sick, just weary. What on earth could be going on, since I never had trouble for 2 years at the beginning? The pH tested on strips does seem slightly alkaline (about 7.5 give or take) so maybe too much dolomite dust too often?
wormadmin Staff answered 6 years ago
Hi Andy,
One thing that seems to be a possibly recurring part of your problem is the seeming lack of bedding, or carbon, materials that should be added to a worm farm as you feed it.
They are needed to set up a worm farm – and they need to be added all the time.
If they are lacking or missing, this is exactly what happens – a wet gluggy mess of a worm bin, with worms suffering over time. It also tends to make harvesting or using the VC a PITA as well.
New bedding (aka carbon or browns) should be added in equal amount to the food being added each time.
Farms that are lacking in carbon often become anaerobic (smelly), acidic and build up alcohols, ammonia etc which harm the worms over time.
Could it be, that even though you don’t ADD water, that when it rains, a lot of water is getting into the farm?
Another pitfall is the taps on the farms often clog up and then liquid builds up in the leachate tray and gets drawn back up into the worm farm when it fills up. My tip here is to leave the tap OPEN with a bucket underneath. Using that leachate when FRESH is the best way to do it anyway – and the bucket allows you to monitor how much you generate.
If you haven’t got it yet, grab my Free FAQ Guide – it has the instructions in it that I give out to my local customers, as well as a heap of other question and answer format information:
https://gum.co/Worms-FAQ
If you HAVE been adding bedding, it may be that you are not adding enough.
If you want to talk about this a little more, drop me an email, so we can talk back and forth more easily: [email protected]
Thanks for asking your question
Regards
Brian