Containers of worms from the Silver Lake flow-through bed

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This morning when I looked out the back window I was puzzled by the sight of multiple buckets of soil-like material sitting in my driveway. My brain hadn’t quite woken up by this point so it ended up being an interesting couple of minutes as I slowly mulled over the possibilities. Was this some sort of strange gift from a neighbor? Did my dad bring me some manure (from his friend’s horse stable)? Did I move bins out on to my driveway then suffer some sort of amnesia-inducing trauma? Was I being rewarded by the “Worm Fairy”?
Finally it hit me!

Leannne…Silver Lake…yeah, that’s it!
🙂

I know some of you have been wondering what happened with the Silver Lake Camp vermicomposting project – more than likely due to the fact that I haven’t provided an update since the beginning of July. Sorry about that!
Unfortunately, I just didn’t have time to make another trip up to the camp (4 hour round trip driving), and Leanne was incredibly busy with running the camp once the kids arrived, so we didn’t end up touching base as often as I initially thought we might.

I did receive an email from Leanne early on reporting a pretty serious set-back. Not too long after I went for my visit, the floor of the bed collapsed! It sounded like quite the ordeal to move all the material/worms, build a new (reinforced) floor, then put everything back in the bin again! I was really impressed with the fact that they didn’t let this challenge sideline them completely.

In her last e-mail, Leanne estimated that they ended up vermicomposting about 200 lb of food waste by the time the last group of kids were on their way home. They managed to harvest and use about 20 lb of vermicompost as well.
Not too shabby at all (especially with all things considered). Diverting 200 lb of compostable food waste from the landfill is very commendable indeed!

I am hopeful that Leanne and David will be interested in setting up the project again next year! I’ll certainly be interested in once again lending a hand (and hopefully will even be able to get a bit more involved).

Previous Silver Lake Posts
Summer Camp Vermicomposting
Silver Lake Vermicomposting-06-11-10
Silver Lake Vermicomposting-07-01-10

Leanne and David Erb (with their two young children) pose for a picture in front of their worm bed

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Yesterday, my dad and I filled two large tubs with worm-rich material and packed up the car with various other vermi-goodies, before setting out on the 2+ hour drive up to Silver Lake Mennonite summer camp.

I was eager to see the Silver Lake flow-through worm bed up close, and to provide the Erb family with one last batch of worms before the first wave of young campers start arriving next week.

I must say right off the bat that the big wooden bed – built by Leanne Erb’s husband David – is every bit as impressive (more so, in fact) than it appeared to be in the photos Leanne sent me (included in this post: “Silver Lake Vermicomposting-06-11-10“)!

It looks as though Leanne has been taking very good care of the worms inside as well. The REAL test, of course, will be when she starts adding multi-pound batches of food waste to the bed each day, but based on how well everything is coming along, I suspect that the system is going to work very well for them (as will the worms).

I was very interested to see what the floor of the Silver Lake system looked like – I wasn’t sure what material they had used for the grate. When Leanne told me it was made of chicken wire I couldn’t believe it, but then I saw the system of support beams that David installed underneath and most of my concerns went away.

The cardboard sitting directly over the grate is decomposing nicely, and vermicompost is already starting to fall down into the harvesting chamber. Leanne mentioned that there seemed to be a lot of worms in the material that had fallen down thus far, but I think once the level of material in the bed increases and there is a lot of food waste up near the top she’ll find fewer and fewer worms in the compost.

I decided to take up my last bag of alpaca manure (will be getting another batch tomorrow) and some stacks of cardboard coffee trays (continually collected by my wife’s co-workers for my ’cause’ – haha) for Leanne so she could provided a bit more variety for the worms and soak up excess moisture from the food waste. I’m sure a group of young campers could have those trays shredded in short order!
8)

On an unrelated (but still interesting) note…

When we first arrived, Leanne showed us the camp vegetable garden. I made a remark about the impressive size of the sunflower growing in the middle (probably about the same size as the biggest “Kong” sunflower I have growing at the moment). When Leanne pointed to a much smaller sunflower and told us that it had been started at the exact same time, I was completely floored – and couldn’t wait to hear about the worm compost I was sure she must be using to achieve those results.
😆

Well, as it turns out, the “secret” had nothing to do with worm compost (oh well – haha!), but Leanne had employed an interesting growing strategy with the larger plant. I can’t remember the exactly name of the technique (something done in Germany, I believe), but it is something akin to “Lasagna Gardening” / sheet composting (layered system of rich organic matter).

Pretty cool!
8)

In my first “Summer Camp Vermicomposting” post I mentioned that I was expecting to receive some images of the finished Silver Lake system at some point. Well, Leanne did indeed send some along (thanks again, Leanne!), so here ya go.
8)

As you can see, it is a beautiful looking worm bed – I can’t wait to actually see it up close! Speaking of which, I am hoping to head up to the Silver Lake camp next week for my first visit! So you can expect a much more in-depth update on the project fairly soon!
8)

A little while ago I was contacted by Leanne Baer, who runs (with her husband) the Silver Lake summer camp for kids, located near Sauble Beach Ontario (about an hour and a half northwest of me). She was looking for composting worms (and LOTS of them), and hoping to pick my brain about setting up a large scale flow-through worm composting bed – with the intention of vermicomposting the camp’s compostable food waste. Needless to say, I was pretty keen to learn more about the project and to lend a hand in any way I could!

As it turns out, rather than selling Leanne worms (a fairly large expense for a project with a limited budget), I suggested we try out a “worm loan” instead. One of her concerns had been what to do with the worms at the end of the season, so I figured it would make more sense for me to simply provide her with as many worms as she needed, then to transport them back home at the end of the summer. Leanne seemed quite concerned about the possibility of me losing my vermi-investment (haha), but I assured her that it wasn’t exactly going to keep me up at night.
😉

The inspiration for the Silver Lake vermicomposting bed was provided by Larry Duke, a prominent member of the vermicomposters forum, and someone I was introduced to by Mark from Kansas (thanks again, Mark!). Here is a cool video tour of the system that Larry put together:

Find more videos like this on vermicomposters.com

Here is a direct link to the video as well: http://vermicomposters.ning.com/video/goterdone-1

I am anxiously awaiting photos of the finished Silver Lake system, but I did get (from Leanne) some shots taken during construction, and it certainly looks as though they are headed in the right direction.

Leanne came by to pick up her first batch of worms this week and we had a good opportunity to chat all about her plans. The kids don’t arrive until July, so June represents an important time for getting the Red Worm population established in the bed. I’m still not 100% sure what sort of food waste output the camp will be producing, but the impression I got was that it could 20-30lb or more per day. To provide an extra boost of vermicomposting power, I was thinking of providing Leanne with some Worm Inn systems as well.

Apart from playing the role of “worm loan and general advice guy” (an honorable title in itself – haha), I actually have plans to visit the camp at least two or three times during the summer to see how things are coming along (and to add more worms to the system). Of course, I will be taking lots of pictures and writing much more about this project here as well! I know many readers will be interested to learn more, and this will almost certainly serve as an important model for other camps and organizations wishing to start similar initiatives.

Stay tuned! Much more info to come.
8)

Mrs. Cordell’s Class has “Got Worms!”

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Hi everybody!

Letty and I have been just as busy as every else lately getting our gardens started. We hope your gardens are off to a good start like ours. Letty is deploying Vermicompost on her tomatoes and she reports her plants are healthy with thick stems and good leaf color!

A little while back I got an E-Mail from Lara Cordell, a teacher in Ohio, who had some basic questions about her worm bin. I found out that her worm bin was in her classroom!

I asked Lara if she would expand on how she was incorporating red worms in her lesson plans – WOW was I pleasantly surprised by her response. What follows is an email Q & A session I had with Lara (slightly modified for this blog post), along with some pictures she sent me.

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MARK – Can you tell a little about what you are doing?

LARA – I am doing a write up of the project for my Board of Education so that they can see hands on science in the classroom and part of my write up was having the students compare plant growth between soil types and how this experiment (with vermicomposting) will add to our Reduce, Reuse, Recycle unit. Plant growth lesson will be an experiment that I will conduct in the fall of next year.

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MARK – Please tell our readers about your school and what made you decide to put worms in you classroom?

LARA – I teach Kindergarten at Northwood Elementary in Marysville, Ohio. Our building houses grades K-4 and has about 515 students in all. I am also the Science Department Chair for our building. With this job I try very hard to get ideas and materials into the hands of classroom teachers to help make science fun and exciting for our students. Currently my students are learning about life cycles. We have discussed butterflies, frogs, and plants. As we started talking about butterflies I ordered caterpillars for us to observe in the classroom. We have watched them change and grow and we will be releasing them this week.

At about the same time we started talking about frogs and their life cycle. Because I had set a precedence with the butterflies, my class had asked me to get tadpoles! Since I could not say no to their eager faces and their enthusiasm for learning I waded into the pond nearby and caught tadpoles for us to observe. About a week before Earth Day it was time for us to begin our lesson on plants and observe the life cycle of a plant. During our discussion of plant we read several books and discussed the different creatures that help plants grow strong and produce more. We talked about bees, butterflies, lady bugs, and of course WORMS!

We set up a Root-View Garden in our window so that we could plant seeds and sneak a peek into what happens underground that we don’t normally get to see. We watched the roots form and the sprout push the seed coat up and out of the ground. During this time we continued to learn more about plants and the creatures that help them. My students love checking in on the changes that are happening in the room with and were beginning to give me ideas as to what we could add to our “Kinder-Garden”. One of the students asked if we could watch worms. This request was supported by 24 more eager learners! Luckily I had taken a class through the Ohio Department of Natural Resources several years ago, so I had most of the materials on hand.

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MARK – Aren’t you worried about bugs? The smell?

LARA – I am not concerned about bugs. I think they will make for some interesting investigations and observations right along with the worms. We have a book that will allow us to try and identify the different critters that make our bin their home. The smell is not a big concern either, as long at the lid is on and we take proper care of the bin we should be just fine.

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MARK – Did the kids think the worms were yucky?

LARA – There were mixed reviews regarding the first impression. I had rolled up noses and kids that wanted to name every one of them! I will say though that all of the kids are very excited about the worms. I have gotten a few emails from parents describing how all of a sudden their children keep running out on rainy days moving worms from the driveway back into the yard!

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MARK – How are you keeping some of the kids from daring each other to eat one of the worms?

LARA – Well, we did a lot of discussion and preparation before our little friends arrived. We read several books and we talked a lot about what my expectations were for them as caregivers of the bin and the worms. We discussed proper handling (in this case I would be the only one handling), what would be appropriate for them to bring to feed our bin, and appropriate times for viewing. I tried to encourage a respect for these little creatures and their habitat. I believe that these lessons were successful as no one has attempted to make a meal of them yet!

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MARK – What do you hope your students will learn from this?

LARA – I am hoping that my students will learn several lessons from this experience. I would like for them to have a better understanding of how hard the worms work to make our soil rich in nutrients that will feed the plants that provide us with food, shelter, and other basic necessities. We also have a large unit on Reduce, Recycle, Reuse. During that unit we spend a lot of time discussing landfills and the amount of “trash” that is thrown away compared to the amount that should be thrown away. Over the next year I will be adding another component to this lesson to include more discussion about composting. I also would like for my students to see the synergy involved in this cycle. That even a little worm can help a giant oak to grow big and strong. To see that when small pieces are working together that big things, life changing things can happen.

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Lara tells me she will keep in touch next school year. I am certainly looking forward to more updates from Lara and her class of “Kinder Gardeners”!

Mark

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Welcome Little Friends!

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“You touch ’em!” “NO you touch ’em!”

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“How many worms did you say are going to live in there??”

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Got Worms??

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‘Mark from Kansas’ is an avid vermicomposter from…well…Kansas, and contributing author here at Red Worm Composting. When he is not tending to his OSCR worm bin, Mark also enjoys spending time with his wife Letty (who also doubles as his trusty vermicomposting assistant) and picking petunias (ok, Bentley just made that last bit up).

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