Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Worm Castings Tea, A Mid-Winter Treat

I hope my worms stop looking at me with that disapproving lack-of-a face they've been making. I had kinda neglected them longer than I should have. I had been feeding them pretty regular enough, but the castings they were producing was building up and I wasn't adding ample dry newspaper to the top to give them a nice sound barrier and temperature regulator. So today I finally went into my two worm bins and harvested some fresh organic natural fertilizer so that they may produce more of the black gold...

...and of course so that my plants would get a January tilthy rich treat. I took little clumps of the worm poo and mixed it about 1 PART POO to 10 PARTS WATER. I then gave all my houseplants a once-over with the solution. This is the first time I have used this fertilizer; I hear the results are pretty astounding so I shall keep posted on this. There is actually a method where one can indeed make worm castings tea(for plants, not humans!) by indeed brewing the castings in air-filtrated water over a few days. I intend to do this as well; they say the best time to apply the "tea" is right after the brewing time is up so some scheduling must be considered in doing this.
Worms are extremely easy to please and what a better way to environmentally dispose of those veggie kitchen scraps?!

Below is just one plot in my indoor garden.


In other news, the forcing of my bulbs seems to be going well. All have rooted. The tulips are growing rather rapidly. The hyacinths have produced an extensive root system and have even shot out a little healthy nub, a precursor to what I hope will be a rich and perfectly healthy bloom.
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2 comments:

  1. How do you know when a worm is giving you a disapproving non-face? Maybe it's just mooning you instead and you don't realize it! :) I need to get some red wigglers. My kid would be all over the idea that it's a good idea to make the plants some tea from POO!

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  2. I have never tried this before, but it looks like quite an interesting process!
    You know, I have found that people who grow food plants to sell for a living swear by worm castings as well as manure tea.

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