Pkboo
Full Member
Posts: 19
Joined: Fri Oct 20, 2017 10:06 pm
Location: Archer, FL (by Gainesville FL)

red wrigglers in an outdoor compst pile?

Ok here's the situation: My family & I moved a few months back. We now live on a little over an acre. I have been wanting to start gardening & compsting for awhile but at our old house I didnt have the room to really do a garden since it was a postage stamp sized lot and no really good sun areas for the plants I wanted to grow but now we have the room to do that. I have ordered a worm bin & worms and have already gotten it set up, worms in their new house and they have been been feed some kitchen scraps that we had saved and also have some stowed away in the freezer for when they are ready for more. My mom & I have been working out in the yard and there is this one spot where its got a pine tree and one other kind of tree kind of close together and all the needles and leaves from the tree have fallen in between them. Mom was going to clear it out since I bought some blueberry and blackberry bushes and we were thinking that planting them in between the trees would be good since it would give them some shelter from the hot summers here but as started clearing came to find out that leaves and needles were deeper then we thought and the ground there is a little soft, guessing from the leaves & needles. So we decided to just leave the needles & leaves and use that spot as an area to put our yard clippings (mainly just leaves, grass and pine needles) and plant the bushes a few feet away. We are thinking that once my worm bin is starting to get too many worms in it that we might move some of them into the yard clipping pile to help break it down a little bit more. We most likely wont be doing much shredding of the leaves or pine needles except for them being run over by the lawn mower.
Just wanted to get some thoughts on it for those that have tried it, if anyone has.

toxcrusadr
Greener Thumb
Posts: 970
Joined: Thu Sep 09, 2010 4:50 pm
Location: MO

Red wigglers apparently don't thrive in outdoor soil, they really like the conditions in a worm bin with a lot of food waste. So they are not likely to multiply out there, and will probably not have a big effect on your compost. Compost works mainly because of microbes rather than worms anyway. But it certainly won't hurt anything to put them out there if you just have too many.

One thing you can do with red wigglers is offer them to other people who want to start a worm bin. Perhaps there is a master gardeners group, or city waste reduction program that promotes composting, or a group getting gardening going in the schools. Any of these might be an outlet for extra worms. You can also post them on the Craigslist farm & garden section.

Pkboo
Full Member
Posts: 19
Joined: Fri Oct 20, 2017 10:06 pm
Location: Archer, FL (by Gainesville FL)

I kind of had a hunch that they possibly wouldnt but since I am just starting out I figured I would ask. I know UF does offer master gardener classes here so that might be an option and also there is a local garden meetup as well so may look into those as outlets for worms since I have already been thinking of joining the gardening meetup just havent done it yet.



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