jenny.shadegarden

  I have adopted a basic rule to organize my plantings - food crops are in containers, non-food pollinators and flowers are planted into the ground. My thinking is that the food crops need more consistent moisture and soil enrichment, which is going to attract the inquisitive, acquisitive roots of the Lombardi Poplar, whose roots radiate over the entire surface of our property. The non-food plants are more used to finding their nutrients and moisture in relation to the existing ecosystem of roots.  I had run out of garden bags yesterday, but the peas and bean shoots were not going to wait for me to get another order from the Amazon. The plastic bins have holes drilled in the bottom to allow excess moisture to flow through. I have ordered another batch of grow bags to transfer the plantings. Come to think of it - I am going to need another load of soil from the city to mix in with my compost and worm castings. I have used up the last of the soil we brought in last year. I could...

  The worms have been busy. Two weeks ago I collected the worm castings and re-organized the bins. Today I collected another harvest of worm castings.  I have eight production bins. I'm not worrying about saving the cocoons. I started by scraping off the top surface of the castings that didn't have any worms. After that I dumped the castings that had no food left in them but were full of worms into a separate 'decanter' bin. I left this bin out in the sun and returned to it every 20 minutes or so to pull off the top layer of castings that the worms had vacated to get out of the sun. At the same time, I turned the castings over and pulled out handfuls of worms to put back into the production bins. It didn't take too long before I had decanted these three buckets of castings and the majority of the worms are back in their production bins.  I was surprised at the volume of castings after two weeks. I'm in the middle of planting the garden and I am using the casting...

  Today I scraped off the top layer of worm castings that still had cocoons and likely wisps, but no adult worms in the mix. These scrapings I put into the orange buckets. The castings that still had lots of adult worms, I put into the blue bin and left out in the sun. Over the course of the afternoon, I was able to scrape off more castings into the orange buckets. This process gives me two more categories of worm bin - the nursery that is holding worm castings with wisps and cocoons, and the sorting bin, where I am leaving the bin in the sun to consolidate the adult worms in the bottom so I can transfer them back into the main production bins. I don't mind scooping up cocoons with the castings for adding to the garden soil, so I am able to collect worm castings from the nursery bin for additions to the garden. Last night I would scoop a cup of castings from the nursery bin and mix them into a small orange bucket of water. I used the scoop to mix and dish out the castings/water mix...