Can you add chicken manure and egg shells to the worm bin?

I've been thinking of doing this and also wonder how they will do when it snows and is really cold outside for an outside bin. I could do a indoor one in the plant room but even that gets to freezing temperatures during the winter. I only use it for starting seeds and keeping potted plants in for a bit so haven't put in a heating system yet.

The chicken litter shouldn't added until it's "settled down" a bit. If you add it while it's fresh and it gets hot, it can burn your worms. They like manure after it's dry, old and past that "burning" stage.

We keep a heap next to the chicken coop, and dump the litter into that heap. I will periodically raid that heap for my worms after enough time has elapsed.

As for eggs, the shells are great, and I use them, but I do wash them first. After being washed and dried, I then crush them as finely as possible and sprinkle them into my bins. I think they help, but they are very slow to be incorporated into the castings. That doesn't both me because I've crushed them so much.

Someone else will have to answer the issue of the coldness, as I don't know yet!

Thanks Dave. I do have a heap that's been sitting almost a year and that was the one I was wondering about using. It needs something done with it so I can put the next clean out mess in that spot.

Yes, that sounds perfect! By now the temperature is settled down and it's ready to go. The worms will love it.

Mindy, thinking about cold winters is hard to do when living in Georgia, but I vaguely remember Yankee winters.

Does the plant room have electricity? If so, would it be possible to use a heatlamp or something to keep the worm-bin area above freezing? (if you have chickens, you should be able to picture what I'm thinking in my head but can't find words to describe - big metal globe with standard lightbulb that clips on things) Or build a box that is larger than the worm-bin and use straw as an insulator between the sides of the box and worm bin?

Just some thoughts, with no expertise to support them (but I rarely let lack of expertise stop me from sharing my thoughts )



as an aside, thank goodness for the preview feature... touch typing only works if you start from the home keys. Otherwise you wind up describing a "bit metal glove" instead of a "big metal globe"

Hi Dave,
I read your article with lots of interest. To tell you the truth I didn't know exactly how worm castings were created so I learned lots! I'm going to attempt this method most definitely.

As you know our summer here in Phoenix is hot. We're expecting 111 today and 113 for the following few days. I do compost in the ground and have lots of garden earthworms that have appeared in that spot. They do a good job of feasting. However, they seem to disappear in the summer. I'm thinking I won't try the bin-harvesting until end of Sept. or early Oct. I just don't have the room in my tiny house to set up indoors.

Can't wait! Thanks for the article!!

Susie, you must report back your experience once you do this!!

I sure will! Can't wait to start. I like the idea of breaking down the cardboard in water!

Soaking the cardboard first turns the job from from a dreaded chore to a pleasurable event.

Do you know if there is a difference between using newspaper (soy ink), or junk mail paper compared to cardboard?

The corrugation in cardboard makes it very open and airy, which is perfect for a wormbin. The newspaper would work fine, except that it has a tendency to mat down into impenetrable blobs that the worms will have trouble with.

I wouldn't hesitate to add newspaper to my bins but I would be careful that they don't mat up.

Grazie!