Joels Blue barrel system

earthbound

Have you ever seen so many blue barrels...... :shock:

Cutting them in half was starting to get very easy towards the end and the circular saw was making quick work of them.

The system has been up n running for about a week now. I was getting some early deaths of yabbies, perhaps one every couple of days since I put them in a few weeks back, but for the last week or so there have been no deaths. The water is starting to clear up and the yabbies are eating well, for the moment I'm feeding them a few chook pellets though I'm going to start supplimenting their diet with green waste from the garden beds, might even drop a few worms in to see how they like them.

You can see that there are a number of worm bins, 13 all up. I've bought a few thousand worms as breeding stock and they've been started in organic cow manure and compost just to get them really powering along so that theres enough stock for all of the bins. Soon they will be fed purely on veggie scraps from the growbeds.

The plants are reasonably happy so far, they've only been in for a week or so, but I'm having some dramas with the syphons.. They start ok when the water level gets nice and high in the gravel growbeds, but then some of them don't want to stop. The water level goes down in the growbed, but stays at a low level, the water seems to keep trickling out at almost the same rate that it's flowing in....

Wierd... It's going to take some fiddling to get it sorted.

The pump I'm running in the system is only 70W, the water flowing through the yabby barrels is barely trickling, but then thats how I want it, the duckweed doesn't like to much disturbance and the yabbies don't need the water flowing too quickly either.

It'll be interesting to watch it as spring starts up, I expect that the system should be well established by then, with all the little kinks ironed out. This is when I'll start keeping records to see how much it can produce..

aquamad

The system looks great - a lot of work there.!!!
Any idea as to the cause of death of your yabbys??
My 2 little ones are doing well and I want to try keep them that way. By the way, how many do you stock per half barrel?

earthbound

Naaa, no idea what caused the deaths, but so long as they are all surviving now, I'm happy. At the moment, most of the barrels have 2 in them, with most of the bottom level of barrels I have breeding pairs, and then in one of them I have 8 or 9 to see that they will be able to live in a reasonably high stocking density. I'm pretty sure that I'll be able to have at least 10 in each one, especially when they are small, I'll be able to have at least double that ib each tank...

Hopefully I'm going to have lots of young when spring comes around, then I'll be able to devise some cages for them to go intosome of my other tanks with fish in them.

Dave Donley

Awesome!

aquamad

souds like you have it all planned out! I look forward to hearing update in the no so distant future

mungbeans

Just out of curiosity - what type of worms did you buy?

earthbound

I'm not sure exactly what type they are mungbeans.... They are a composting worm bought from the "B" store.. I think they will probably vary from state to state, mine came from a local company originally called action worms.

mungbeans

The reason I asked is that the most common composting worms are known as 'Red Tigers', although they are in actual fact tiger worms rather than red worms. The latin for them is 'eisenia fetida' - fetida is the latin for 'fetid'. When stressed (such as when fed to fish) they give off a horrid fetid smell that the fish find repulsive. For this reason red tiger worms don't make good fish food or bait.

The best way to check is to find one of your adult worms and look for bands (hence 'tiger') on the worm. Eisenia fetida also has a yellowish tail.

For fish food you will need either red worms (lumbricus rubellus) or blue worms (perionyx excavatus).

Gary Donaldson

Most backyard worm farmers (and some of their larger commercial counterparts) will tell you that the worms that they sell you are a mix of Reds, Tigers and Indian Blues.

In fact, most of the composting worms that you buy are the worms to which Mungbeans refers......Tigers.

David Murphy ("Organic Growing with Worms") confirms that fish do not like to eat Tiger worms. He suggests that true red worms (lumbricus rubellus) are not readily available so that leaves Indian Blues and African Night Crawlers.

If I could breed large quantities of either, I would be making good money selling them to fisherpersons.

For low cost animal protein, superbly suited to fish, you can't (in my opinion) go past fly larvae.

On a more relevant note, that's one fine-looking system, Joel.

mungbeans

I must admit growing fly larvae is only tooooo easy. Just get a small composting bin and add lots of meaty scraps. They also love milky bread, so when it comes time to get them out just put a slice of bread dipped in milk on the top of the compost heap - cover for a few hours - come back and you will have no trouble scooping them up. Yum.

steve

I just bought my compost worms from the "B" i have repeatedly fed them to my tropicals and the oz natives and the yabbies, none of them seem to have a problem, and rip the poor bugger apart if more than one fish sees it first

I will take a close up picture of a few for you more experienced "wormers"

to identify for me. I'll also feed the ones i have taken pics of and report back. Interesting stuff.......i had read about this once before, but just dismissed it as i had never had a problem. I may have just been lucky and actually got the red's ?

Steve

aquamad

I must have them tigers in my leaf compost heap as when I fed them to my barra they did not touch them... I moved their hiding place a few days later and the worms were under it (still alve!!)

earthbound

George sells African night crawler worms specifically as bait worms... Good bloke to, he bought my book...

http://users.tpg.com.au/mingin/

steve

Are african night crawlers considered composting worms? as destinct from standard earth worms.

If yes then this is a good thing, as i can incorp. 5 kgs nto my worm farm.

It might get a tad pricy at $55 per kilo otherwise :shock:

steve

To answer my own question, yes they are composting worms, but they may not be the best choice for colder climates

Quote:

AFRICAN NIGHT CRAWLERS

African Night Crawlers are a tropical worm raised as an excellent bait worm. Some grow to twelve inches long, although a 6" African is the best for bait. Called a 'night crawler, the African is not a 'true' night crawler, such as the Canadian. The African would be best described as a tropical composting worm. African's require more care than red worms, but can successfully be raised in captivity. They must be kept between 70F and 80F, with the optimum temperature between 74F and 78F to reproduce. They can survive the cold, as low as 40F, provided they are taken there slowly. A soil thermometer should be implemented. If they are raised indoors, to keep their beds at 70F, the air temperature would need to be about 80F. Heating devices can be purchased through various worm dealers and farmers, or homemade. African's are also more sensitive to acid build up in the beds. A pH meter can be helpful in determining the increase in acid. A generous sprinkling of ground limestone, (calcium carbonate) every two weeks will keep the beds at the ideal pH, about 6.5. The egg capsules hatch at approximately 30 day intervals. Most African's reach a six-inch length, three to five months after hatching. A 2' x 12' bed started with 1,200 breeders will produce approximately 15,000 worms in one year, provided they are kept in the optimum environment. A bed depth of four to seven inches is ideal. African's also tend to roam more than a typical red worm. If they are attempting to leave, and you are certain that they have feed, the proper pH, moisture and oxygen, just keeping a light on top of their bed will keep them home.
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Maybe the european night crawler might be better? Found this on a google cached page from a shut down "tomato" site

Quote:

Worm Species Data

Eisenia fetida (foetida)/Eisenia andrei
Common names: redworm, tiger worm, manure worm

Maximum reproduction under ideal condtions:
3.8 cocoons per adult per week
83.2% hatching success rate
3.3 hatchlings per cocoon
Net reproduction of 10.4 young per adult per week

Maximum growth rate under ideal conditions:
32-73 days to cocoon hatch
53-76 days to sexual maturity
85-149 days from egg to maturity

Temperature requirements °C (°F):
Minimum 3°C (38°F)
Maximum 35°C (95°F)
Ideal range 21-27°C (70-80°F)

Eisenia hortensis (Dendrobaena veneta)
Common names: Belgian nightcrawler, European nightcrawler

Maximum growth rate under ideal conditions:
40-128 days to cocoon hatch
57-86 days to sexual maturity
97-214 days from egg to maturity

Temperature requirements °C (°F):
Minimum 3°C (38°F)
Maximum 32°C (90°F)
Ideal 15-21°C (60-70°F)

and this says that they will not teolerate under 15C

http://res2.agr.ca/london/faq/tomlin03_e.htm

Sorry for the long post :shock:

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Joels Blue barrel system

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