Unveiling the Hidden Secret to Supercharging Nutrient Availability in Raised Beds

55 Gallon Worm Compost Bin- Harvest , Feed and Look at a new raised bed
/ @plantobsessed
This bin was made from cutting a 55 gallon food grade barrel in half long ways and screwing the open ends together to make a 6 foot long bin.
To see the previous video click here • 55 Gallon Compost Worm...
The bin lives in the cellar of my 200-year-old house. In the winter the furnace dries it out, and in the wet season the moisture leaching through the bricks makes the basement very humid. The current set up was started near the first of the year 2021 after the wormpocolypse. A rat was in the basement and all the bins had to be moved to totes and buckets with lids on to protect them. When the rat was ended, I added 4 or more of the in-progress bins/ buckets with the compost mix of red, blue and European nightcrawlers in them to fill the big blue bin. I continued to add ground leaves and food. Currently the bin is undergoing a refresh. I am harvesting the castings as the top of the bin dries and adding new bedding and food. Keeping the moisture even in the bin is difficult in the wet summer. I flip or fluff the bin to keep the air in the bedding. Back to the wedge method starting now.
I am an Amazon affiliate. The items below are the Amazon affiliate links for the items I use in my wormery. I have read and recommend these books. The cost is the same to you, but the channel will get a small commission if purchases are made using the links.
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[@augustineschaefer5522]

We hit -40 for a bit so I’m living vicariously through your spring bed prep.

[@PlantObsessed]

I won't be able to plant anything for a month or more. I do plan to put out onions next month.🪱😃👍🏼

[@lindaspellman2108]

My new beds were created with veggie plant residue, pumpkins and leaves in the fall. My outdoor worm bin froze a few weeks ago so I dug in the beds to find more. Sure enough those pumpkins were super slimy and full of worms. Got about a half pound to restart the bin!

[@PlantObsessed]

Worms are so resilient. We had negative 30 here a month ago and there are live adult worms in my garden.🪱👍🏼😀

[@Energydrink.]

You're a certified Worm Mom. 10/10 content.

[@PlantObsessed]

🪱👍🏼😀

[@A-V]

Watching the huge wedge setup in Blue getting managed is always so satisfying. Those raised beds look really awesome too. Great video!

[@PlantObsessed]

Thank you. I hope the new bed makes great onions. 👍🏼🪱😃

[@mikkosgarden]

Your new bed is off to a great start, if only the weather would cooperate with us this year.

[@PlantObsessed]

Yep I have snow right now lol. One more month.👍🏼😃🪱

[@v8v83838]

When you live in a hurricane zone a stove top percolator is a must. Have used mine many times, and I think the coffee taste better than my high dollar Bunn. Glad you and hubby are safe and sound. We got some of that bad weather as well (south Mississippi). A tornado touched down in a neighboring town, but no one was hurt.

[@PlantObsessed]

I'm glad you are ok too. I have a French press too. Sometimes old tech is better than new. 👍🏼🪱😀

[@lindap9079]

What am I doing with my bin? Like you I want to cut down, if not eliminate, reliance on store bought fertilizer. I live alone, and I'm a cheapskate, so I opt for once-a-month garbage collection. I use my worm bins, I have 5 going right now, to recycle all my food waste.

[@PlantObsessed]

I wish we had a monthly option for garbage. We would be happy to do that.😀👍🏼🪱

[@GardeningwithBarchuckin]

Blue is looking good Ann. I always like your explanations of why you do what you do. The new bed is looking great, as with all new beds there will be some settling. Great amendments to help kick start your growing season.

[@PlantObsessed]

I didn't get very big onions last year I'm hoping the new prep helps.🪱😃👍🏼

[@jerrycallison6125]

I think you are spot on in your question, "What do you want your worm bin to do?" I think too many don't really know what they are looking for, and they waffle back and forth with moisture levels. (I admit to having done a bit of that myself early on. We tried to be all things to all bins, and that doesn't work.) I loved your tomato skin. :-) Pumpkin, watermelon, and squash do the same. I love seeing what looks like green and black cellophane, knowing it's watermelon skin. When they eat cantaloupe, it looks like lace. Great content!

[@PlantObsessed]

When I was new to worm bins the cantaloupe blew my mind. Lol. Worms are so cool. Thank you for watching 😃🪱👍🏼

[@nenaenriquez3480]

Red wigglers are my favorite pets 😂

[@PlantObsessed]

They are such good worms 🪱👍🏼😀

[@Vermicompost]

Awesome video Ann!! I love to see see the different phases of your “CFT” horizontally…I just hope the inside of my UWB looks half as good as Blue!! Awesome raised bed setup!! We just converted our one big bed into three medium sized beds before my shoulder surgery…I can’t wait to get them all planted out with Autumn’s help!!🪱🪱🪱

[@PlantObsessed]

Good luck with your shoulder recovery. Producer turns into co-star of the VCLBD worm show!!🪱😃👍🏼

[@Vermicompost]

@@PlantObsessed Thanks Ann!! She's a one man band taking care of the worms & me!!

[@peggyhelblingsgardenwhatyo7920]

Greetings Ann, from Windermere, Florida zone 9b 🇺🇸 ❤ Great Blue feeding 💙 🪱💙 I love your new raised bed and it's going to be a beast of bounty this Summer. You're getting real close to 10K👍 ❤Peggy❤

[@PlantObsessed]

I hope the bed does well with my onions. Last year they were tasty but small. I hope with this bed they will have room to stretch out. 🪱👍🏼😀

[@ausfoodgarden]

100 gallons of castings? Wow! you are doing a fantastic job. I'd be lucky to get 20 gallons a year from my little tower system and a couple of totes. Once I've finished moving and set up a bathtub version of your Blue, I'm hoping for a lot more. I'm just trying to create enough compost and castings to feed my veg garden. Not there yet as I'm still building. (almost from scratch now we've moved again) Cheers!

[@PlantObsessed]

That is rough moving and redoing a garden system. I hope you have good luck with your tubby blue 💙👍🏼🪱

[@katiem9644]

That is an amazing worm bin of castings. Oh my!

[@PlantObsessed]

Blue is everyone's favorite. 😀👍🏼🪱

[@annsalty5615]

Please give us an update on that new garden bed when you have planted. 👍

[@PlantObsessed]

Absolutely 😃👍🏼🪱

[@cathyplantlover2862]

I love the blue worms they are so feisty....lol

[@PlantObsessed]

That is a great way to describe them lol. They are absolutely feisty 😃👍🏼🪱🪱

[@AJsGreenTopics]

I finally decided that office paper only goes in the outdoor compost bins.

[@PlantObsessed]

Yeah, I hope I remember lol don't do that again. 😃🪱👍🏼

[@juliepoolie5494]

That’s great to hear you have red wigglers in your garden year round! That’s my goal. I only have two small indoor totes and I want to put half of them in my garden this spring in an in ground worm bin made out of empty ice cream buckets.

[@NanasWorms]

I run four of these inground garden worm buckets, Julie. I live on Vancouver Island and the worms live just fine year to year. My one caution is you must continue to feed the buckets (i.e., treat them like a worm bin) because if you stop feeding them, the worms will start eating your organic matter and mulch in the garden! ~ Sandra

[@PlantObsessed]

True. I have a feeding pipe in my large garden I feed them with.

[@the_green_anna]

@@NanasWorms Isn't that a good thing, worms eating the mulch and producing wormcastings in situ? If you don't make sure they get enough mulch however... 😬😅 Have had potatoes, with a lot of little holes on the surface, on one occation. Scratched my head. Couldn't figure it out. Then I found a compostworm-butt sticking out of a hole.... 😄 They had nothing else to eat, poor things. Have kept them well fed after that.😇

[@NanasWorms]

@@the_green_anna Hi Anna, i love that they travel around depositing castings in my garden! We are in drought conditions through the summer and I need to keep mulch on my garden at all times. I wasn't feeding the inground worm buckets enough and the worms ate through all my mulch several times that summer. I find if I keep the buckets well fed, the mulch stays in place longer. Of course, I would rather them eat the mulch than my crops! So strange they went after your potatoes! ~ Sandra

[@the_green_anna]

@@NanasWorms Yes, very strange! Didn't think they could eat live plants. The holes were very small and it didn't do much harm. Ah, that explains things. Maybe I should try that too. Thank you! 💚

[@zina6581]

Thank you for all of the great information!

[@PlantObsessed]

Glad it was helpful!😃👍🏼🪱

[@hudson8865]

Thank you.

[@PlantObsessed]

You are very welcome 👍🏼🪱🙂

[@brianseybert192]

Nice way to manage that bin, you can basically go in there anytime and harvest a bucket of castings. One of the things I hated about the jumping worms is they killed off all my red wigglers in my beds, hopefully I knocked down the JW's enough last year and my red wigglers will come back. Do you ever use castings or casting extract or tea for your seedlings? All I use, plus some compost extract as fertilizer for my seedlings. I give the worms birdhouse gourds that spoiled over the winter, the gourds leave a thin paper that also resembles plastic. Good to mention to cover the beds after amending to block the UV radiation, many people do not even think about that. Nice video! Stay Well!!!!

[@PlantObsessed]

Where I live we have not seen the jumping worms yet. It is only a matter of time. I do wonder if they will infect the raised beds. I did see your video on the JW. Did they out compete the Raw or actually eat them? I do use worm tea on all the plants. I don't know how I gardened so long without it. 🪱👍🏼😃

[@brianseybert192]

What I found as I baited out the huge # of jumping worms last spring, the red wigglers were dead or dying. In the early spring there were a lot of red wigglers in the shredded leaf trapping areas, as the JW's emerged when the soil temp reached the mid 50'sF the red wigglers were affected. Nobody to my knowledge is investigating how this happens, no $$$ in it I suppose. At 1st I thought the JW's out competed the red wigglers, I found out otherwise. Hoping this year I can fine tune my assault on the JW's. I know if you mulch with leaves in your garden, they will take over. As I said, that is all I give my seedling, plus some compost extract as well. Year #2 no external fertilizers for my plants. Stay Well my friend!!!!@@PlantObsessed

[@the_green_anna]

Sure miss the sifting... That's my favorite part. 😁 It's also really enjoyable watching you go through all that lovely material. Blue is awesome! 💙💙💙

[@PlantObsessed]

True story. My 1/4 inch was upstairs with the ANC. 😀👍🏼🪱

[@carlafawcett3851]

I can't believe you are already able to garden! We are still freezing and under snow. My worm bins have gotten wet over winter and I need to rescue them quick. They were in the house and in a too small bin I think : )

[@PlantObsessed]

Lol I'm not gardening yet. I'm starting seeds and prepping the beds. I can plant onions in March and brassicas with cover.🪱👍🏼😃

[@kinsjsmggoiktaylor5659]

I Only Have Tiger Worms Great Composting Worms

[@PlantObsessed]

They work great 👍🏼😃🪱

[@sandyjoao4489]

Love yr raised garden Ann. Blue is really a busy bin and the worms surely like it in there. Good wormies just like mum ha ha ha

[@PlantObsessed]

He is definitely the work horse of my wormery. 😃🪱👍🏼

[@ScotWalt858]

All good!

[@PlantObsessed]

Yep 😀👍🏼🪱

[@dawnpettiglio6930]

I am making castings for my own use, but I need to dramatically increase the number of worms so I can increase my worm castings.

[@PlantObsessed]

The worms will double in population every 3 months. If you give them space and keep it wetter than my bins you will soon have more worms than you know what to do with. 🪱👍🏼😃

[@cherylhowker1792]

My worm bins; I have a tower farm the worm house I call it. And that has the original worms I brought with it plus any they have laid. Then in a small tote/ box I have 600breeders and every 3 weeks I change them to new fresh bedding and let the caccons hatch in there. Then once they are big enough worms and become breeders, I will maybe start another breeder bin or they will go into my farm or into the compost bed, as I have a box I bed in compost and feed them in that. And I have another that has spares from a bucket system I had going at one time. The breeder bin and the nursery bins I keep as moist as possible without going anaerobic. That’s a fine balance. And then the farm and compost bed is less moist but a good moisture.

[@PlantObsessed]

That is great. Do you sell your worms? 🪱👍🏼😃

[@cherylhowker1792]

@@PlantObsessed no not enough for my own use atm that’s why I’m breeding them up I hope

[@cherylhowker1792]

@@PlantObsessed I would love to get to the level where I can sell if I want too. But I would also like to be able to teach others locally about how best to keep in my opinion- like without the need for letche, the run off, by adding more dry bedding or more water by spray if too dry. So people can use litter boxes etc and do it on a budget. As my farm was over £100 as all I could get at the time. There are now a couple of sellers in the uk I’ve found. That sell similar for less but when I was looking it was hard. So I want people to know it can be cheaper then it looks and you don’t need anything fancy. Xx

[@scrapzwtf]

Help! I’ve been searching for a video with instructions for building your diy stacked bins. I have heard in some of your videos the changes you’d make if you were doing it again and I can’t find those now.

[@PlantObsessed]

The play list for the diy stacked bin should help. I don't think there is a video for when i made it the first time. Thank you. Happy Worming.

[@MonzGary]

New sub. Do u have to aerate big blue like that often or do you think the worms would be fine with hust feeding that one side until you harvest? I recently inherited a 55 gallon blue barrel and am trying to deicde if i should go horizonsl or verticle cft with it, looking for low maintenance. Did seem pretty nice on the castings side, urs.

[@PlantObsessed]

The bin is a bit too deep to let go forever without fluffing. You could try every 3 months and see how it does. Let us know. 👍🏼😃🪱

[@rdraffkorn3184]

wheat berries are in the spent mushroom substrate i mix with my compost (leaves and food scraps) still recognizable when the mushrooms are done but by the time it gets to the harvesting end of my bins i don't find any wheat berries at all ...

[@PlantObsessed]

Cool, I'm glad to know they should get digested soon. 🪱👍🏼😀

[@NanasWorms]

Hi Ann, do you ever pull out the whole finished end to Blue? it seems like if you had the need for castings you could pull out 3-4 buckets full of finished material. That seemed to be a little bit smaller feeding this time around. Is Blue on a diet??! Those amendments will make a fantastic new bed for your onions this year. ~ Sandra

[@PlantObsessed]

Unfortunately we are in the hunger gap for the worm bins too. Not as much fresh veg and fruit. They are indeed getting more bedding than people food. I have only harvested blue heavy once when the rat was in the basement. Since I sift, the moisture is the limit to when I harvest. 😀👍🏼🪱

[@jerrycallison6125]

@@PlantObsessed Do you have a food pantry nearby? We get a lot of waste produce from ours. It keeps it from the landfill, plus it saves a great organization money on garbage disposal.

[@PlantObsessed]

@@jerrycallison6125 I'll ask around. Thanks for the idea.

[@lindaripp5902]

First time here, I don't know what I'm doing, so I'm growing my worms inside my little 4 ft by 8 ft Greenhouse. Is that wrong? I was planning on also putting some plants in there LOL

[@jerrycallison6125]

No reason not to that I know of. You have found the right place. Anne is a great teacher. I strongly recommend you look into her older videos and binge on them for a while. You will learn a lot. She did a LOT to help me when we first started our worm farm.

[@PlantObsessed]

So kind 😊👍🏼😊

[@PlantObsessed]

My only worry about the green house is it may get too hot in the summer. What kind of worms do you have?😊👍🏼🪱

[@matthewbrown4895]

Do you used the 1/12 sifter for eggs? I see you have the set, but also 1/2, 1/4, and 1/12.

[@PlantObsessed]

The 1/12 works well for ENC and red Wigglers 🪱👍🏼😀

[@johnb-lz9mg]

Can worm castings that sat around still be used? I have some from 2 years ago. They are in a bag and are very dry. I have also heard of some bags having use by dates on them. Thanks

[@PlantObsessed]

2 years is pretty old. If you have A worm bin I would put the casting in a bucket, get them pretty damp then add a few worms to refresh the microbes for about a month.🪱😀👍🏼

[@johnb-lz9mg]

Thanks I will just get more and throw them in the garden.

[@PlantObsessed]

This is a link to the 2 items I used in the video. They are Amazon Links that I will receive a small commission from. The price will be the same to you. Azomite - micro nutrients amzn.to/3wk7bvG Green Sand amzn.to/3uB3ily

[@usnamom78]

Wait... what kind of hay/straw was that you're using?

[@PlantObsessed]

It comes from a big box store. It's called EZ straw chopped straw with tack. It's about 15$ 😀👍🏼🪱

[@user-bk8kb1ir1y]

Looking to join two tote bins together and populate more red wrigglers as this is my first year in this way of living of the land as much as i can

[@PlantObsessed]

It is very rewarding to grow my own food. 🪱👍🏼😀

[@romanticwarrior97]

Subscriber here. Do you ever use "worm tea?" I don't recall if I've seen you make a video about it. If so, does it any difference if you use moist or dry castings?

[@PlantObsessed]

Here is a video about my worm tea.🪱😃👍🏼 kzbin.info/www/bejne/g2ewlHmKltKNf6c

[@romanticwarrior97]

@@PlantObsessed Thanks for that link. I haven't made worm tea before and don't plan on making mine as muscular as yours with all the added amendments. I don't create near as much castings as you so I'm hoping to stretch it by going the tea route and diluting it a bit. Hopefully I'll get nearly as good as results as you. Thanks again!

[@PlantObsessed]

@@romanticwarrior97 a good half of the time it's just castings in water for me. They do just fine. 👍🏼😀🪱

[@justbeachy2031]

Aren’t you losing nutrients when the castings are dry?

[@PlantObsessed]

You are right. Letting them get completely dry is bad. I don't let them dry 100% if so then the micros may go dormant or die. 🪱👍🏼😀

[@jeffsullivan3362]

Couldn't you just populate your beds with worms and just let them drop their castings in the bed?

[@PlantObsessed]

The worms castings likely have cocoons in them. I hope the worms will be there in about 30 days. 😃👍🏼🪱