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Covington, Wa., USA

I am finaly getting on board and using compost tea this year. What is the best feed for worms that produce the highest quality castings and the most microbes? Also can you include things like alphalfa meal in the worm bin to feed the microbes as well as the worms?

1/13/2011 11:23:36 PM

Gays Mills, Wisconsin

What kind of worms do you have? What techniques for feeding the worms do you use? The diets can be the same but optimal feeds for certain worms have been designed.

Alfalfa meal is excellent but a diversity (wheat, barley, oats, grass clippings, etc..) in foods might be better. Mix with good quality mostly-finished compost and/or a rich peat soil, keep lightly moistened (squeeze test should barely get a drop of water to drip ... very important for optimal growth of desired bacteria)
Foods should be finely ground.

I got into vermiculture because of the high costs of buying real good castings. Glad I did, it's good stuff plus I've got thousands of nightcrawlers to go fishing with or to use as my patch "rototillers" !

W/o getting into fungal vs bacterial teas, worm castings are a great source for bacterial teas, worms digest nutrients from the soil by bacterial breakdown in their bodies then release this bacterial laden "cast" into the soil. Nutrients in organic materials are plant ready after this bacteria breaks it down.

Alfalfa meal as a worm food mostly is fed on by bacteria, however when added to teas it could be more of a fungal food.

For the most part, a bacterial tea is of choice for foliar application on plants for several reasons. John

1/14/2011 10:44:29 AM

Covington, Wa., USA

I have red wigglers. For the last few years i have been using horse and alpaca manure for the beddig and feeding them scraps from the kitchen and garden. I've never realy considered what might be the best food for them to give me higher microbial numbers.

My thought with the alfalfa meal was to actualy feed the microbes in the bin. Can you create higher microbe #'s in the bin by giving them what they like to eat? Which would then get you off to a better start when used in compost tea.

1/14/2011 1:08:36 PM

Seattle, WA

Best microbial activity I've seen was from horse manure, but you have to be careful that there were no antibiotics or other chemicals given to the horses.

With good fungal (high carbon) and calcium sources (oyster shell powder for example) in your worm bin, you can get a tea that is high in fungi as well.

I find that both bacteria and fungi love alfalfa meal.

1/14/2011 2:03:50 PM

Circleville, Ohio, USA

My brother has a small garage red wiggler worm farm where he puts left over kitchen scraps(no meat or grease)and under the screen on which they live juices collect and he saves it in half gallon containers. Even after 6 weeks this worm juice doesn't smell bad. Would this be a good source of good microbes? Has anyone ever tested worm juice?

3/4/2011 9:17:17 AM

Seattle, WA

What you're describing is a leachate, and many gardeners love to use it. It will contain soluble nutrients, similar to an organic fertilizer. I would use it as soon as possible, rather than trying to store it, and be sure to dilute it down quite far (10:1, 20:1, water:worm leachate).

The reason it hasn't started stinking is cause there isn't a ton of microbial activity in it. You will get some bacteria and possibly flagellates, but no fungal hyphae and not the same diversity or concentrations of microbes as an aerated compost tea.

3/4/2011 2:33:47 PM

Circleville, Ohio, USA

Tad12 Thanks for the info on leachate.

3/4/2011 5:12:47 PM

Redmond, Washington; U.S.A.

I use the worm tea and have also seen it to have fertilizer property's. It jump started my peppers one year with noticeable results. I have been using worm tea from my uncle. Last year I used it regularly and I have no ill effects on my pumpkin plants.

3/22/2011 3:52:37 PM