Silent Listeners, Unseen Guests

I can almost recall the words of the dining room wall motto that remind us of the unseen guest at every meal and the silent listener to every conversation.  Without taking anything away from those good thoughts on the presence of God, I've been applying the same sentiments to a host of unseen guests and silent listeners that took up residence in a corner of our dining room last week.  

Almost a week ago Tristan helped me get all 1,000 of the guests/listeners settled in their plastic tote home, nestled among the newspaper strips we moistened and placed in the tub first.  Carson watched.  I told the boys the names of the new residents:  Eisenia foetida.  Eisenia foetida(s) are in charge of the vermicomposting tasks in this household.  They are earthworms, which is actually a slight misnomer since they are not subterranean dwellers, but litter dwellers.  They are sometimes called manure worms. 

I've learned that since these 1,000 worms weigh about one pound altogether, I should offer them a daily meal of plant material scraps weighing about one-half pound.  That's a fairly substantial volume of items like potato and carrot peelings, celery leaves, apple cores and peelings, coffee grounds and tea leaves.  The food scraps are buried in the bedding, so as not to create odors or attract gnats.  If the kitchen scraps are too slow in arriving, the worms will consume the paper in their bedding.  When the tub contains mostly castings, I'll move the worms to a new tub, or let them move themselves by setting a bedding-ready tub with holes in the bottom into the first tub.  Food will attract the worms to the new living quarters.  

These quiet "pets" would freeze if they were left outside over winter, so an indoor environment is perfect for them. I really don't know that the dining room is the best permanent home for them, but that's where it was easy to put them for now.  For this first while at least, I'm keeping a log sheet of when I feed them, how much I give them, where in the tub I place the food, and any notes I might decide to add.  Placing the food in a different corner every day inspires the worms to follow the food around the tub, thus spreading their castings throughout.  

I don't know how many of the Master Gardener class members ordered Eisenia foetida, but most of the people that travel back and forth in "my" van did so.  We didn't start talking about it as early as we should have, but we compared notes on the way home today.  Some of the others had escapees at first--something I didn't have a problem with at all.  They always seek dark places, so perhaps my loose-fitting cardboard lid helped me out here.  Since a bit of light is visible around the edges, they stay away from it.  Jim thinks it's neat to be able to ask casually, "How are your worms?"  He was proudly wearing a T-shirt today that said "Jim's Worm Farm."  It came from a business by that name.  

In the presentation we had in class on vermicomposting several weeks ago, the slide show ended with a photo of a sign in a business where fishing worms were offered for sale:  "We have worms in the rear."  Oh dear.