Help me help my worms (stay warm). Vermicomposting in the Winter!
December 1, 2008 6:23 PM   Subscribe

My worms are getting cold! I started a vermicompost this summer, in a big plastic bin on my balcony. It's working very well, but the temperatures have dropped and the little wrigglers are getting cold and slow. Two options: move the bin to my unfinished basement with a dirt floor, or try to insulate the bin well enough to keep them warm in their current location. The basement is probably best, but I'm worried about mice! Any suggestions to keep all of the critters happy?

The bin itself has holes in the bottom, which lets the excess 'tea' drain out. I haven't bothered to try and catch this liquid - it just goes into the garden below, which is fine. But if I put the bin in the basement, this liquid (and the bin itself) will likely be an attraction to mice and rodents, which we've had in the past. I'd rather NOT attract the rodents, so I don't just want to set out traps/poison or check no-kill traps everyday. This has to be a fairly low effort solution.

One idea was to buy another bin, and since they stack with a bit of space left over in the bottom one, that would catch the tea. But that requires me to empty out the bin every week or so - is this my best option? Just let it seep into the dirt floor (it's terrible down there anyway)? Are the mice going to be attracted to the bin even if I solve the tea/liquid issue? Rig up something else to keep out mice? Make a big warm and plastic case for the bin and keep it outside?

Any ideas or suggestions would be welcome.
posted by barnone to Home & Garden (13 answers total)
 
How cold? Could you just put a light on them? Or perhaps a cold frame? Will your red wigglers just sleep the winter away if you leave them be?
posted by Lesser Shrew at 6:50 PM on December 1, 2008


Response by poster: Raleigh/Durham NC area. The coldest it usually gets is about -5 Celsius (in the 20s Fahrenheit) but the area has been known to get colder snaps. They're currently on a covered balcony - not on the ground.

That mat looks like it could work, but neither area has an outlet. I could rig something up if absolutely necessary but I'm trying to keep this low-cost/low-energy.

Thanks so far!
posted by barnone at 7:00 PM on December 1, 2008


Best answer: I don't think that mice would be attracted to the worm "tea" so much as they would be to food scraps. I think that if you put something underneath the worm bin to catch the run-off (I'm thinking Rubbermaid tub that's big enough to hold the whole bin, maybe set on a couple bricks), and if you are careful about what you feed them, you can safely avoid the mouse issue.
posted by mudpuppie at 7:02 PM on December 1, 2008


Best answer: Bring them in the house. It's my understanding that worms won't survive long in temps below 40F. As long as you don't have any meaty things in the compost bin, it doesn't smell at all. My Igors are here in the office with me, munching away on today's crop of eggshells and tea leaves.

Because my worm bin is in a trafficked part of my house, I don't worry about rodents. Catch the tea underneath in a plastic bin, but if there's that much tea you may be keeping your worms too wet.
posted by workerant at 7:57 PM on December 1, 2008


Er, I meant a high-traffic part of my house. I don't mean to suggest there's an illicit trade in back-door-hallways.
posted by workerant at 7:58 PM on December 1, 2008


Best answer: Yep, seconding the rodents-not-an-issue if you don't include bread or meat in your scraps. The basement should be fine with a second layer bin to trap the tea. I have a bottom tray in my farm and a spiggot on mine and the tea drips into a bucket for use on the garden.
posted by Kerasia at 9:11 PM on December 1, 2008


If it's really, really cold perhaps you could (find an electrically safe way to) put a home brew heater belt around the bin? Not the most energy-efficient solution, I admit, but it could give you very warm, happy worms.

disclaimer: I know only the basics about worms and absolutely nothing about homebrewing.
posted by [ixia] at 2:39 AM on December 2, 2008


Best answer: I live in Durham, and my worms are in an unheated outbuilding. Last year I was worried about them, too, but even though we got down to 15ºF a few times, they didn't die. If you have a basement, that sounds ideal. (You have a BASEMENT? Lucky...) I'd just put your bin in another bin with holes in the side rather than on the bottom. Then you'll still get airflow, but the goodness won't leak onto the floor. If you made your bin from a rubbermaid tub, it should be easy just to get that second bin of the same size, drill some holes in the sides, and plunk the first bin inside of it.

Also, as a point of reference, my outbuilding does get mice, and they've never gotten into the wormbin.
posted by Stewriffic at 3:43 AM on December 2, 2008


Best answer: Not sure what kind of bin you have (I have an OSCR Jr.) but definitely bring them inside into the basement. I used to have the second bin underneath the main worm bin to help catch the leachate, however, I had a difficult time getting the leachate out. I would have to pull up hard on the main bin to get it out of the second bin and often there would be a lot of liquid sloshing around at the bottom of the second bin. Too much, actually. I started to think that maybe I was feeding them too much wet food or that the second bin didn't allow for a lot of air flow for the liquid to evaporate.

I discarded the second bin, got a boot tray and three small pieces of wood and a scrap of carpet. I put the scrap carpet on the floor, then the boot tray and then the pieces of wood (maybe 2" x 2" x 5") on the tray and then placed the main bin (which sounds like your bin with all the holes in the bottom) on top. That way, my worms aren't sitting on the cold floor (because of the carpet) and aren't sitting in leachate (because of the wood).

I monitor the moisture in the bin by the amount of leachate that drips onto the boot tray. I don't really care about the leachate so I just let it dry out. Also, I don't like my worms to be too wet so I alternate by adding drier things like lettuce and broccoli stems instead of pepper or watermelon.

As for the rodents, you can use a Rubbermaid lid and drill holes into it or make some kind frame with a metal screen.
posted by KathyK at 6:22 AM on December 2, 2008 [1 favorite]


Dig them a hole outdoors, and let the nice warm ground help them stay warm. Piling straw, mulch or leaves over them will help, too.
posted by theora55 at 6:59 AM on December 2, 2008


Response by poster: Thanks for all the advice!

Basement is a euphemism for "the house is on a small slope, and underneath half the house is this dirt-floored, uninsulated, monster-infested space. Where my clothes dryer is. Hence the line-drying outside whenever weather permits." So I'm not too sure about being 'lucky'. But it's pretty warm down there, so with the suggestions that mice shouldn't be too attracted, I'll stick the worms down there. Discovering mice in my pantry was psychologically scaring, so the second that they make a peep, the worms are getting kicked out!

I'll try the second bin or tray thing and see how it works out. I'm just impressed that I'm willingly dealing with worms, quite happily even, and am now bringing them into my house. This is all a learning curve for me :-) Thanks again!
posted by barnone at 8:10 AM on December 2, 2008


Aha! You have a crawl space. That's a fabulous place to keep them. I've considered putting mine in our very tiny crawl space over the winter, but it's kind of hard to access. Do make sure to keep the worms in a dark space, if your bin is translucent rather than opaque.


Also, I was grossed out by my worms at first, but now I can paw through the castings without even thinking about it. I'm especially tickled when I harvest castings--after I pull all the worms and castings out of the bin and put the big pile in the sun, all the wormies go hide from the light in the bottom of the pile. Then I scoop off the outside castings, and there's a HUGE ball of squirm. Love that. I love my worms. It's an excuse to act like a kid making mudpies.
posted by Stewriffic at 8:51 AM on December 2, 2008


2nding KathyK's advice to use spacers to raise the bin above the tray or 2nd bin. I have a small bin in my kitchen that sits on an old cookie sheet. The only time it smells is when the drippings collect into a small puddle. Now that I've raised the bin off the cookie sheet with some spacers, the drippings dry out fast enough to not be a problem.
posted by hydrophonic at 9:27 AM on December 2, 2008


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