Night Soil

We stay away from composting human manure. (No safe place for it on an urban farm) But I know some folks that swear by it as a great way to create more compost for plants and keep waste out of the waste streamline.

Here is a great article on another person discovery "Is it safe to compost human waste" on NPR

 

Hotel Composting!

This beast is a beauty!

Boston’s Seaport Hotel & World Trade Center is the first hotel in the country to install a new industrial composting machine to churn out an incredible 4.5 tons of composting material each month.

little critters in your worm bin part 3

As we have talked about before, the food scraps you add to a worm bin today, isn't really touched by worms until at least several days later. The food has to start to break down first. How long depends on how quickly a population of microbes can begin to decompose that material, and make it ready for worms to consume. The frustrating part is a great variety of food waste harbors fruit fly eggs, which hatch quickly in the bin. They are actually a good sign of a healthy bin. But can be reduced, but that is for another blog.

If we could only encourage worms to start eating that food waste right away, before most of the flies are born. Actually, we can do this! Just let food waste develop this microbial population before it goes in the bin. If you collect food waste in a counter top food scrap container, try this:
1. cover the container with a towel (to prevent fruit flies from pestering you) and let it sit indoors for a week. For an even better start, sprinkle finished compost or vermicompost directly onto the food waste as you toss it into the food scrap tub.

2. freeze your food scraps until needed. let them thaw out, then put them in your worm bin. This reduces fruit flies and the freeze/thaw also breaks down the food faster. Thus, encouraging the worms to dig in quicker!

Checking on the cloth bin

I was checking on our cloth worm composting bin last week.
I noticed the Indian corn I put in there was sprouting!

Nice moist environment, happy sprouting space. the worms were breaking things down nicely, I have to add some more water. not a lot though. that is the nice thing about the bags, you can't really over water them because it will just run out the bottom. But you do have to watch the moisture level closely so it doesn't dry out too much.

Found some happy baby worms, a good sign things are moving along nicely in your worm bin.