Kitchen Scraps Mulch - Update 4

It's been a few months since I put kitchen scraps as reverse mulch (bottom of the pot) under my habanero.  Then I put a couple of African Nightcrawlers along with the scraps.  I wanted to see if the ANCs would survive in the pot and turn the organic content inside the pot into vermicompost.    A couple of days ago, I decided to dig up the pot to see.    Compare it for yourself. 

If you look at pictures 1 and 2, that's show's a month's difference.  In particular, examine the amount of additional mulch on the top side of the plant.  While picture 1 shows the pot filled to the brim with mulch picture 2 shows about an inch and a half decline.  Considering that I throw in additional material several times a week, you'll appreciate how fast the organic material degrades.  Was it due to the worms?  Perhaps. 

If you compare pictures 3 and 4, you'll see a big difference as well.  Whereas picture 3 has a whole newspaper on the underside covered by a week's worth of kitchen scraps, picture 4 shows mostly humus and some worms.  Now the inside of the pot wasn't exactly crawling with worms as I had hoped, but there were still some there.  However, I've also seen that the worms migrated to some of the other pots beside my habanero as well.  That's why I have cardboard and newspaper under the pots so that the worms can easily move from a bad spot to a good spot and always have something to eat.   I think this also goes to show that if you plan it right, composting worms can survive and thrive in the sunny side of the garden.

 

---

Growing Melons in my Flow Through Worm Bin - Terminated Experiment

I've been eating a lot of melons the past few months and I've been feeding my African Nightcrawlers a lot of melon rinds.  I've also been throwing lots of melon seeds in my various worm bins.  Because of this, a lot of seedlings have been growing in my worm bins.  So I figured maybe I'll try growing these melons to term in one of my flow through worm bins.
It's been going great too.  I was wondering what to do if the roots grow through the bottom of the tray so I decided to put the tray on an aquarium with lots of paper, food and of course, worms. 

Today, I've decided to terminate the experiment.  Why?  I looked at the aquarium earlier.  It was disgusting.  I even saw a cockroach!  Eek.  There was too much water flowing through the bin and into the aquarium...murky water. I decided to just move the seedlings into a 5-gallon container instead.  I'll just add more material every few days.  There are still worms in there anyway.  I just hope they don't bake since the container is out under the sun.

As for the aquarium, I did what other vermicomposter would do.  I added dry shredded paper all the way to the top of the aquarium.  I'll stop adding material for a few months.   I'll check back in a few months (hopefully it dries up before the rainy season. 

---