An Act of Mercy: I killed my worm bin

As a bit of a disclaimer: I'm not going to go into great detail about the specifics of composting methods.  This is strictly my experience and should not be taken as expert advice.  There's a lot of info out there about how to properly do this stuff.  

I have no regrets.  Worm bin composting can be tricky and high maintenance in spite of what its proponents say so if you fail as I did, take heart.  You are not alone.

It started out as a bit of an experiment.  The man and I were looking for ways to compost in our small apartment.  We tried a Bokashi bin but found it too small for the amount of organic waste we produced, and then we had to find somewhere to bury our unfinished pickled Bokashi bits.  For those of you not familiar with Bokashi composting, it's basically a process by which your food scraps are "pickled" using microbe infused bran.  It's fairly mess-free and non-stinky, but the bins are small and you need to do something with your bin contents to finish the whole process off.

So the Bokashi bin was out.  Would a worm bin be our solution?  It seemed easy enough.  A colleague donated some worms (red wrigglers to be specific) and assured me that it was a no fuss deal.  I did a little bit of reading (but not enough obviously), bought a medium sized plastic bin, drilled some holes, and went to town.  My worms seemed happy enough for a while but it didn't last.

Kill Justification #1: It just couldn't keep up

So, it turns out that you can't just feed your worms all of your scraps.  They can only eat so much.  I understood this.  The man, not so much.  We started slow, but after the population grew he kind of went a bit crazy and it wasn't long before things got stinky.  Our poor worms couldn't handle all of the stuff we were giving them and the whole thing had turned into a rotting mess.  Bad smells are a major sign that all things are not well in your worm bin.  It took months for the bin to recover and then once it did we were extremely paranoid about how much we put in it.  This resulted in us not putting very much in it at all so it wasn't very effective for us reducing our waste.

Kill Justification #2: Space and maintenance

Some internet research showed that not only was our bin being overfed, but it was also waaaay too wet.  Our bin had lots of air holes but no drainage holes on the bottom.  At the time I made the bin I was assured that I wouldn't need them.  That is wrong.  Our bin needed drainage - big time.  Veggies are mostly water so when the worms eat them they produce water as a by-product.  We tried to counteract the problem by adding more bedding more frequently but then our bin was just full of paper most of the time which didn't seem to be really effective.  

I thought about drilling some drainage holes but then shuddered at the thought of the logistics of caring for the resulting runoff inside our small apartment in the winter time.  All of this stuff sounds so easy in the summer but what happens when you live somewhere where there is snow on the ground for half the year?  

Kill Justification #3: Backyard Salvation

We moved to a house with room for a backyard compost bin.  End of story.  The worms couldn't compete with the convenience of having the composting process occur OUTSIDE where it kind of belongs.

Our new backyard compost bin

At the end of the day, I'm willing to admit I just wasn't dedicated enough to be a successful worm bin composter.  And I don't think I'm alone.  It was so frustrating to be an apartment dweller and not be able to compost but I don't think I'd try it again.  Green living still has to make sense for your life, right?  

I buried my worms in the garden of our new house.  I know they won't live to see spring but at least they will provide a healthy snack for the earthworms?

News & Excitement

Well hey there, kids.  It's been a while.  I know that I probably should explain my absence and beg forgiveness but why don't we just agree to move on together?  There, isn't that refreshing?

Here's the update: After a three year exile, I am making a not quite triumphant return to the metropolis of Edmonton.  Now, this is a significant step considering I spent the greater part of my youth concocting plans to flee the place.  I spent a year in Europe and moved to Camrose just to get away from it.  And after all this time I have learned that, yes boys and girls, there are worse places to be than Edmonton.  So here goes, my top 5 reasons I'm excited to move back to Edmonton:

1. Household recycling pick-up
Oh yes, believe it or not, Edmonton is a champ at the recycling game.  I never really appreciated the joy of household recycling pickup until it wasn't there anymore.  The system in the borough of London where I lived in 2007 was similar and it wasn't until I moved to Camrose that I really learned how awesome I had it in E-ville.  The blue bag rocks.

I did make my best recycling efforts at the drop off location in Camrose, it's just such a serious pain in the rear.

2. Public Transportation
Camrose gets a bad rap these days for its lack of public transportation but the truth is that there isn't really anything that isn't a good 20 minute walk from just about anywhere in town.  That being said, I can see how a lack of wheels would be a major pain if you were a senior or disabled.  Or had to somehow get a massive bale of toilet paper home.

My rural counterparts don't often share my enthusiasm for riding the bus.   To a lot of people buses are associated with a lot of unpleasantries like smelly homeless people, smelly crazy people, and waiting in the elements.  To me, public transportation means not having to worry about parking, paying for parking or fighting traffic and for this I am more than happy to put up with the occasional stinker.  Plus, I'm really looking forward to walking off the 15 pounds I've gained since becoming a regular member of the motoring public.

3.  Backyard Gardening
Yes, I've had multiple gardening experiments in the last couple of years but it's a hell of a lot easier to maintain a garden when it's right in your backyard.  The new casa's garden is small but it'll do for some veggie growing.  The deck should also be helpful container experiments.  If only I didn't have to wait all winter to get started...

4.  Variety is the Spice of Life
Oh man, am I ever excited to live somewhere where a girl can get a half decent tandoori chicken. I was going to say "where the majority of restaurants aren't pizza joints" but that's the sort of thing that's difficult to verify. But seriously, how much pizza can a town of 17,000 people eat?

 5. Less Drive Time = More Free Time

Is it very obvious that I dislike driving intensely?  I don't want to say hate because I sure love a good road trip but man have I grown to seriously abhor the hour long drive between Camrose and Edmonton.  I may have exiled myself from Edmonton, but man is my life still there.  Between visits with family, errands for family, favours for family and the occasional thing I want to do, I've spent a lot of time in the car.  And I can't wait to not have to do it any more.  I also can't wait to not have to pay for all that gas!


I'd always had very romantic notions about small-town living and the rural life.  I guess I'm over it.  It can be cute and quaint but I'm an urbanophile out and proud.  It will be good to be home.  At least until I get sick of it again...

Got Gnats?

Hellos to all.  Long time no see.  My apologies for being away so long.  Gainful employment has proven to be a major bummer on the blogging front.  Turns out it’s also a major bummer on green living front.  The lack of time has made green experiments scarce around here but today I’ve got a doozey.

My little kitchen herb garden has been trucking along all winter.  I’ve lost some good soldiers to lack of light and a cold window sill but for the most part, winter has been relatively kind to my increasingly green thumb.  Recently I’ve developed a common winter problem for house plants - fungus gnats.  At first I thought they were just fruit flies but after carefully ensuring I didn’t have any flies in my worm bin and any nasty rotting produce anywhere, I took a closer look at the little buggers and realized they were something else entirely.

Fungus gnats are little flies that are commonly found in potted plants.  Apparently commercial potting soil can be full of larvae and their hatching may have been triggered by me overwatering my plants while they’re in a semi-dormant state.  They are also super annoying.

After scouring the internet for a non-chemical cure, I started to experiment. 

Step 1: Drying out my plants.  Apparently these suckers thrive on rotting organic matter (aka the roots of my plants) so I stopped watering my plants for 2 weeks.  This of course came with some risks and it appears that I’ve lost one of my basil plants and possibly my oregano  but everything else seems to have survived.  I’m down to watering only once a week and very sparingly.

Cutting back on the water helped a bit but still wasn’t doing the trick so I had to try something else.

Step 2: Cinnamon.  When I saw this idea on a UBC Botanical Garden Forum, I was highly skeptical but I really didn’t want to have to resort to chemicals so I gave it a try.  I started with just a sprinkle on the surface of the soil because I really wasn’t sure how crazy to go but after about a week I went for full soil coverage.

Sad dehydrated parsley with cinnamon soil

Step 3:  Lemon juice.  Again, seriously?  But reason with me for a moment.  Apparently the little buggers are attracted to the colour yellow. So I used a couple of our little soy sauce dishes from the ole sushi set and set them up on the window sills.  The gnats are attracted to it and then they drown in the lemon juice.

See those itty bitty dead flies?

Result?  Victory.  Well, they’re not completely gone, but things have improved dramatically.  I’m still watering only once a week but the flying population in my household has decreased dramatically.  Dare I call this green experiment a success?  Do you have any green pest control success stories?