Worms and Compost

I have been promising to write about compost for a few weeks and once again there was a little prod needed to get me active. The thing is I don’t have an answer. I have been asked about worm farms… (stage whisper) I don’t know the first thing about worms.

Judi wrote

“Good morning Peter, Please can you advise me of a small problem I think I have I have built myself a worm liquid farm from a large council bin, (bought I might add) has been working fantastic until recently, it now is full of a tiny insects. My liquid went from one litre a week of worm liquid down to about 1/4 btl. I take it the insects have something to do with this. Can I spray, it was suggested I use vinegar, but will this affect the worms. Would appreciate your advice."

PLEASE help me. If you know anything about worm farms, let me know.

Why do I link worm farms to compost? My mother in law judges the health of her compost by the worm activity and bans me from putting citrus peel in the compost because it upsets the worms. By contrast my grandfather used to keep an especially rancid compost bin that was almost exclusively lawn clippings, he did keep a beautiful lawn. What’s going on here?

Uncle Dave’s (my grandfather’s name amongst his nursery contemporaries) compost stank because he stewed it. No oxygen could get into the bin with all those fine clippings so the process of breaking the organic material down was painfully slow and the by product was ammonia. Phew!

My mother in law is on the right track. The process of breaking compost down is driven by micro organisms, much smaller than worms. These little guys need air and water and they feed on the organic matter in the compost bin. The bit that I like is they need a balanced diet, that’s why grass clippings alone don’t compost so well. Plus there’s the connection to organic fertilizers, Peter Cundall used to throw heaps of Blood & Bone into his compost mix. Why? Extra nitrogen to encourage the microbes to work harder.

Compost and worms? If the composting process is working optimally, there won’t be any worms living in there. It gets too hot. All those microbes generate a lot of heat, enough in fact to ‘pasteurize’ a lot of bad organisms (including some weed seeds, I’ll get on to just how tough some seeds are one day) out of the compost. Poor old Wilbur Worm wouldn’t cope with a mix that is so hot. A well aerated hot compost mix will also break down more quickly.

On the other hand worms are pretty good at treating soil and organic matter too, so if your compost is supporting a worm community it must be healthy even if it is not quite as efficient as a well aerated compost. Have a look at the Aerobin site, expensive but very clever.

I have some ideas about what is wrong with Judi’s worm farm, but they are guesses. If you know anything please fill me in.
By the way, the pic came from the Foxnews web site and a funny(?) article about gardening replacing Viagra.

May Planting

It’s funny how some things happen. I received an email early this week suggesting I offer some “what to do in the garden this month” tips. “That’s a good idea” I thought, but I also imagined it would be complicated so I’ll put it off until later. Then of course the second request arrived, this time with a deadline.

So here are my suggestions for garden priorities in May. Let’s just keep in mind a few things about the last month of Autumn.

· The weather has cooled considerably but the soil is still reasonably warm.

· Make sure beds for planting are thoroughly prepared so that late plantings can get started quickly. Any unnecessary stress on the plants will cause bolting or premature flowering.

· Any annual flowers or vegetables we plant now will have to grow through winter and mature as the days lengthen and temperatures rise in Spring.

· Melbourne’s winter is relatively mild, so we can bend some of the rules. Frost will be the primary consideration in many areas although I admit Ballarat might just get too cold for some of my suggestions.

What can we do?

· Rake up the leaves! Put them in the compost. (Yes I will get back to compost soon)

· Plant Onions. Spring Onions and Leeks can be planted pretty much year round. “Keeping Onions” like Gladallan White and Cream gold are ideal for planting now and through winter. Their bulbs will fatten up through spring and into the summer.

· Plant Beets. Silverbeet, Chard and Beetroot.

· Leafy vegetables. Spinach and lettuces. Spinach copes with winter quite well, lettuce require more skill and care. Open headed ‘picking’ lettuce is generally considered easier to grow than the Iceberg, heading types.

· Have you tried Winter Salad? It is also known as Corn Salad, Lambs Lettuce or Valerian. It is a very popular winter green in Europe where the winter is too cold for lettuce. Serve fresh or lightly steamed.

· Peas? Really cold weather may affect their productivity but we find that Snow Peas and Snap Peas (my favourite) will grow year round.

Any Flowering plants?

· Primulas and Primroses. Nearing the end of the planting season, but will still establish well and flower in the early spring.

· Pansy & Viola. Plant any time of year. Flowering through winter will be sporadic but they will be well established for a stunning spring display.

· Most other spring flowering varieties are the same, plant now but you will have to wait for flowers: Dianthus, Lobelia, Digitalis, Delphinium, Snapdragon and Geranium.

Don’t forget Alyssum and Chrysanthemum paludosum will give bright spots of flower at any time.

Happy Mother's Day

I have had some great photos come in recently, mostly from schools. It’s a bit of a stretch but I thought Mother’s Day was a good a reason as any to show them to you.
Our most regular contact with schools is through donations we make for fetes and Mother’s Day stalls. It’s sad but true that even in a week like this one where we are struggling to find stock to fill all our orders we still have plants that are no longer usable in retail nurseries. Generally they’re just too big, so we are happy to do something for the community.
I really get a kick from the plants that go for gardening projects at school. We were supporting the Gould Group and their Multicultural Schools gardens, but unfortunately they have since closed their doors. I’m pleased to report that we have maintained contact with a few of these schools. We have also had calls from schools participating in the Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Program. I love the tag: growing, harvesting, preparing, sharing.
So, if we can help at your kid’s or grand kid’s school or your community garden, church or garden club please don’t be shy. All I ask in return is that you help me get in contact with your community… and send me some photos so I can show them off.
By the way, I was trying to show off some photos here but my isp is having a go slow and I can't work out how to set up a slide show so please follow this link to our web site to see more.

I’m going to leave fertilizing for a week or two, although I have had a very good enquiry about composting so I’ll get back to that soon.
I was giving a garden club talk this week and the question of “damping off” raised its ugly head. The poor lady asking the question didn’t even know what the problem was but she had spent good money on punnets of seedlings only to watch (some of) them slowly die, before they even got started. We have had a similar problem with large landscape plantings too, ouch!
Have you ever planted seedlings and had them just sit and not grow? Have you ever checked the roots of these plants? Always start with the roots. Often Pansies particularly will just sit and go nowhere, if you pull on the top of the young plant it will just come away from the soil with no roots attached. A root rotting disease has eaten the roots away. See the image above of young Soy Bean seedlings.
The most common form of the problem with flower and vegetable seedlings is a fungus called Pythium. Often it will cause no obvious problem, but if your plants are stressed say having just been pulled out of a punnet and squashed into the ground or planted during very hot or very wet weather the fungal spores have the opportunity to attack.
What are the solutions? Minimize plant stress! Start with strong plants with a healthy root system. Yes you should check the roots of any plants you buy. If possible, water your new seedlings in with a fungicide called Fongarid. Fongarid comes as a powder from your garden centre. Add some to a watering can and water your plants in with it. One application should do the trick. Treat Fongarid with the care you would any gardening chemical, but I am confident it is safe to use, it doesn’t actually kill the fungi, it provides the plant roots some protection.
What else can you do? Fungi like Pythium live in the soil. I don’t recommend fumigating soil (nasty poisonous stuff), so you will need to apply the Fongarid every time you plant out once you have found your soil is carrying disease. If you are growing in containers, throw out the old potting mix and wash your pots with chlorine solution, household disinfectant will do fine.
If you are really interested in Pythium, follow this link. I haven’t used the product ‘Re-bound’, but it is a chemical related to Fongarid and they give some really good background on Pythium.
Oh and if you are really keen follow this link to Wikipedia there is a list of the Pythium species as long as my arm.