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http://www.phoenixpermaculture.org/video/video/show?id=2008067:Video:9395

Is this a viable method? Will those compost worms go out into the soil leaving their castings behind as the video suggests?

Interesting! I think it may depend on your soil temps whether the worms will "move in and out" of the tower. I've read that the compost worms don't typically live in soil, but maybe they take day-trips...?

Well...

I guess it would probably work for the area immediately surrounding the pipe. But why would a person want to do that?

Why not just bury the whatever in holes in the garden and let the worms find it?

I say thumbs down.

Worms even somehow find my compost bins that are on concrete in rolling trash bins. I'm not sure the extra work is really necessary----but I'm a lazy composter!~

LOL imapigeon I have my doubts about compost worms being daytrippers and ice_worm I have been digging kitchen scraps and wood chips into my garden all year. I spray with EM before covering things back up and when I dig around looking for worms...well they just don't seem to be there in any quantity. I thought the idea of a worm tower was pretty good but also thought it needed a reality check. There are many good ideas that look great on the surface but after digging around seem somewhat lacking in reality. So, I thought I would check with the experts here on this forum.

Here's more on this method:

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/949688/

Someone trying it with the strawbale approach, which makes sense to me.

One caution on this...reading this was quite disturbing to me, because I was all gung-ho on the worm tower idea until I started reading how they feel about earthworms up in Minnesota. Dunno if this is considered accepted fact everywhere now, but up there they say their area for sure, and perhaps the whole of the US didn't start out with earthworms, we Europeans who came here to stay probably brought them with us as eggs and in soil around plants--apparently in the UK they are native but ???

Anyway, in Minnesota they're campaigning hard to get people to stop and think before they turn fishing worms and composting worms loose into the great outdoors as 1) they really are an exotic species (and you all know it's illegal to turn loose an exotic species, right?) and 2) they've apparently got pretty good proof in Minn. that earthworms are (get this) destroying their hardwood forests and understory and setting off this horrible Aarmageddon-like chain reaction that's changing everything, plants, the animals that live on the plants, the critters that eat them, and I suppose, us too. Apparently the understory plants need deep duff, leaf debris which breaks down ve-ery slowly, and when the worms hit the dirt, well, the only thing left after a short while, is deep dark loam, which you'd think would be a good thing, and it is for gardens, but not for the kind of old hardwood forests they have up in Minnesota.

Dunno how I fell about all this, but I thought I'd mention it.
I'll get back with the link if I can find it in my history from last night so you can read it yourself.--Melis

Here it is:
http://www.nrri.umn.edu/worms/

very distressing, this. Though I suppose there are already worms where I am, so I wouldn't be making things MUCH worse if I had a worm tower.

BTW to answer 'why would you', the idea, besides a great way to cut down on how much garbage goes out of your house (some of us do pay by the can) it improves the soil right around the tower. IF I get this right, E. foetida is the kind of worm that creates 'middens' which means, when they feel the need to 'ease nature' (i.e. take a dump) they go to the surface and cast their valuable wormcasts right outside their front door. Their front door is your soil. Therefore, me, for instance, I was thinking when I got a surplus of worms, I'd put one in the side yard that years ago used to be a dog run, and then got dug up when the waterline burst, and now is nothing but gravel and subsoil. Needs help out there, I tell ya.
Melis

Very interesting, thanks!

Blew my mind that there are whole vast tracts of land up around the Great Lakes which have *no* earthworms of *any* kind and they believe that's the normal native condition.

who knew?

This worm tower thing is a bit confusing to me. What I have read so far, E. foetida is supposed to be the most suitable worm for composting. However, they do not dig tunnels like Earthworms do. So, the castings/poo will not be carried outside the tower.
IOW. the WT concept won't work using EFs.

Other than Earthworms, is there any other kind available in N. Am. that dig tunnels and are good composters as well?

I didn't know E. foetida didn't make tunnels. Not that I doubt you, but where'd you get that info from? i'd like to know more about my new little friends,so if you've got some informative pages on them, I'd enjoy reading them.

Melissande:
I remember that from reading the various posts on forums and on web-sites in regards to vermicomposting or worms. a.o. you can read up in
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eisenia_fetida

Thanks. I did do some research, but it wouldn''t be the first time I read right over some things and missed them. I'll check out the link.--M

Otis,
The Canadian Nightcrawler (Lumbricus terrestris) is a burrowing worm.
It digs deep burrows (up to 6 ft deep) and comes to the surface to feed. They generally feed on plant material, they are great in the garden but I don't think they would do well in worm bins.
http://mypeoplepc.com/members/arbra/bbb/id17.html

rtl850nomore,
Worms poop outside of their 'living-eating quarters"... that's why you find castings on the surface of your bin and the worms beneath.
So the pipe could work.

Ice, perhaps the reason some find it better than digging a whole is that you don't have to dig a hole every time you want to dispose of kitchen waste.

Dove

I have a hard time with the Minnesota worm scare.
If earthworms were reintroduced by explorers and settlers, (and probably nomadic Indians) and that process began as early as the 1500s, I would call 500 years the beginning of a natural evolution. If the Great Lakes Worm Watch can blame car tires for spreading worm eggs, then why not Buffalo hooves and the like. It's a natural process, just as natural as bird droppings spreading plant seeds in efficient little fertilizer clumps.

One of the organizers of the Minnesota Worm Watch said "We know just anecdotally that there are worms in lots of these places, but they have never been documented,"
Apparently they also just anecdotally know worms are harmful.

Well, an anecdote is something based on or consisting of unscientific ideas or observations. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anecdotal_evidence

I think the Worm Watch is a Minnesota Chicken Little.

Amy Stewart published a book "the Earth Moved" that describes how the glaciers moved the original american topsoil south, along whith the ancient worms. She feels that the current populations are from centuries of europeans moving th the US bringing, inadvertently, worms and coccoons in their potted plants, dirt on their wagons, etc.

She also discusses the worm issues in Minnesota and some California forrests. The introduction of worms to the topsoil changes the plant cover and affects the wildlife and trees in these areas.

Interesting reading!

Jeff da Vermeister

As for the original post and worms being day trippers, I would agree, but how much food can you store in a tiny container?

I have an outdoor bed surrounded with straw bales started last spring. Covered it with glass (stormdoor panels) through the winter, and it never froze, even in northern PA winter! Am building an additional one 8' x 20 feet as we speak. Photos available.

Jeff, da Vermeister

Yeah Kurtzinpa, your right about Amy Stewart, she' a bit passionate about the earth and what grows in an above it. your bin looks great, and doesn't freeze, thats excellent ! another lady full of good knows is in Idaho, Christy http://wormbincomposting.blogspot.com/ and Amy, for anyone one wondering http://blog.amystewart.com/worms/ and http://blog.amystewart.com/ good luck with the super-size, it's said that wigglers don't like it under 40 or over 80 degrees, but compost piles I have here in washington state are steaming in the winter at times. your straw insulation and window solar look the ticket.