Worm castings

[suebee]

Hello all, its been brought to my attention that someone is selling manure as worm castings so i thought i would
let you all know what exactly worm casting are and how i get mine so that if you want to make your own worm pile you too can have your own worm castings.
If you have bought what may be manure do not use them this could also include medicines that have been given to the animals like worming meds or antibiotics..
First you need a clean compost pile.. and a clean place to have it..
if you are going to have access to it all year around it needs to be in a place that will not freeze like a barn or basement. You can buy a compost bin that spins to flip over or use a wood box like i do with pitch a pitch fork to flip the compost. Left over foods, safe plant clippings, leafs from safe trees, corn meal, comfrey, seaweed, and sea lettuce. potato peels, old crab substrate, old crab food scrapings from cleaning the bowls, as well as scrapings from cleaning the bowls from feeding my pet parrots are things that i feed my worms.. Also plants and safe weeds from the garden that are safe and have to be pulled to make room for the next planting. I also add in some crushed oyster shell, egg shells too. Sand and mineral rich clays.
To get worms.. I have a Friend who has organic fed rabbits that are grown for meat. Under the rabbit cage i used a rake to rake away the first few layers of waist and there are tons of earth worms to start my worm farm i first got as many as i could from there. brought them home and put them in a bucket with a mix of organic potting soil and corn meal with some top soil and as some of the compost i mention above.. as the compost starts to decompose i add more. It has to be wet down often to keep it moist but it gives off a nice heat to keep it warm in the winter from the compost biodegrading. When you take a pitch fork and move about 6 inches of soil off the top of my worm castings now you start to see 100's if not 1000's of worms.. The worms are used for fishing. The crabs love the worms.. I would say It took a good 2 years before i would say that the soil was full of worm castings. That is because the size of the bin.. Its about 6 foot long by 4 foot deep by foot wide..

now when you buy worm castings from me, i go out dig sift and pack the soil the worm are living in and casting or compost that the worms have decomposed and processed that they are living in!
It never stinks.. and it never is manure!
Now what are worm castings?
Worm castings are worm manure they are the breakdown of organic matter by earthworms or compost that has passed through earth worms! And crabs love them! Not to mention that they are good for them and full of good things for them Magnesium, Potassium, Sodium, Phosphorus, Sulfur, Nitrogen, Boron, Copper, Iron, Manganese, Zinc, 60-70 Trace Minerals and Elements

Just a little worm casting story.. the worms actually belong to my Grand father, he lives 2 traffic lights from my house..
His is the house with the big "worms for fishing" sign out front in the summer. Ha ha.. people know the house..Well when i go to deliver my
food scraps and get castings to bring to my house ( snow is coming and i wanted to make sure i had some for orders ) he always comes out with me and we turn the worms together.. He still doesnt quite get that i come for the dirt..I get a bucket and we start to screen the worms.. he will say
"there are some big ones! ill grab them and put them back, he will laugh and shake his head. Ill see some tiny ones and put them in a cup for my crabs, again he shakes his head.. eventually he walks away to tinker around with the snow blower. once i get my 5 gal bucket full of sifted worm castings he asks the same questions..."Did ya get your worms? I nod my head..Did you get the babies for your crabs? i nod and laugh..Did you leave the good ones for the fish?
I laugh and say yes Pop Pop. He laughs out loud and shakes his head at me..and off i go..at 45 its not that often you get to spend time with your
Grand father, its times like that that i treasure.. even if he is laughing at me..

I can tell you for sure that if you bought Worm castings from the places we have listed here they are good worm castings ive used the ones from the Hermit crab patch and know that they are good.. I would just say ask when you buy, know your source.. ask for references and check feed back if they have it.. Be aware of new places and be careful what you buy.
Happy Crabbing, Blessings, Suebee