Farewell, Dear Worm Box, RIP

So....it seems that the way to keep your feisty little worms alive and well and not completely decimated is to not leave them for two weeks while you go on vacation. I know this seems like a no brainer, but I did leave them plenty of food and young Becca did visit them every few days, spritzing their box if it seemed hot or dry.

Then we come back from Vegas, it looks kind of OK in there. Due to their digestive prowess, it is hard to tell what is vermicompost, what are coffee grounds, and where the worms are in that mess. And then a few days later it was all over. Suddenly the box was overtaken by white mold, every inch of it. It is totally suspect since everything was carefully washed or frozen before being added to the box. Grrr! The composting people really need to train their interns to answer emails already, because they were no help. Alas, Andrew laid the little worms to rest just yesterday and cleaned out their box completely unsure if we will try again.

Very sad indeed....and now in their honor, a shark pouring a little out, for the wormies.


~beth

The Indoor Compost Box: A Must Have for Manhattan Girls (And Boys) This Season

Last week I went to a very long-awaited indoor composting workshop provided by the Lower East Side Ecology Center. I had initially heard about this months ago (September 2007 to be exact), signed up only to be robbed of my worm box by a cancellation due to inclement weather. The following two workshops conflicted with life in general and I went without a worm box. I know this may sound slightly off to those of you who do not have eco-anxiety like I do but Andrew "Recycling Boy" can testify to my broken record declaring that I would be so much better off composting things instead of landfilling them for months now. So when we were shut out of this one, I was about to give up. Thanks to my minx, Dani, who gave me her spot so that my vegetable cuttings and I could have some solace.

Enough with the dramatics, let's get into it. What is a worm box (bin) you might ask? A worm box is a small clear plastic tote with a snap on lid that is outfitted with four air vents. The box is ideal for the placement of worms, their bedding, and your food scraps to create an indoor composting atmosphere. This allows you to put certain food scraps, decaying plant matter, and some paper waste in the box to feed the worms and yield glorious nutrient-rich compost months later called vermicompost. This being in bin form allows those who do not have access or space for full scale outdoor composting to do so in the small space of an apartment.

"One red worm processes half of its own weight in food scraps every day!"

I pride myself on knowing quite a bit about worms. I used to catch them on the farm as a child, throw them in my favorite flowers to try to help them grow, etc. I did not know, however, that the only worms that actually create vermicompost are red worms. The kind bought at the workshop were Eisenia fetida. the bin comes with a pound of worms, roughly 1,000 who all told can power through roughly half a pound of scraps a day, or three and a half pounds of food a week.

You begin with a crafty paper mache feeling leading me to wish I had grabbed the box made in class instead of making it myself. I assembled a bowl of water, three copies of the Village Voice (They print using soy ink. Who knew?), my pound of worms, and a ready-made worm bin from the workshop. After tearing all the papers into long strips, wetting them, then wringing them out, I tried to make some fluffy moist bedding. Then I dumped in the worms onto the top of the bedding leaving the lid off in the light for about an hour so they would be prompted to burrow into the bedding. The instructions asked that the box/bin be kept somewhere between the temperatures of 55 and 75 degrees which might be tough in NYC in July, but I tried to stash it out of direct light in the kitchen. I like composting, but it's not going in my bedroom....


When you decide to when to feed the worms, you can do it daily or once a week depending on what works for you. Things that are in large pieces (think broccoli stalks) should be cut down so they are easier to be eaten by the worms (who do not have mouths, but have gizzards instead). Each time you feed, rotate where you are putting the food and put it under the bedding, adding more bedding as needed. Basically, the worms eat their bedding as well.

Items you can feed your worms: Red worms eat fruit and vegetable scraps, crushed egg shells, coffee grounds, tea bags, and leftover breads and grains. They should not eat meat or fish scraps, dairy, or fatty or oily foods. Vegetables are largely made of water and will keep your box damp, however, you should spritz then bedding with water it it is drying. If the temperature is an issue, you can cool down the box by freezing your scraps then introducing them to the box. I may throw in the occasional ice cube to cool it down in there for the little hermaphrodites.

After my worms burrowed I went to the refrigerator to see what items were waiting for my new little buddies. They got about 6 ounces of blueberries past their ripeness, some chopped tomatoes and lettuce from a forgotten salad, a coffee filter of Fairway's best blend, and a small container of plain brown rice leftover from Asiakan (serious yum). So far so good, they are pampered by the soy ink Village Voice and some lovely colorful nip.


As I learn more about my own worm box and composting there will certainly be troubleshooting updates!


The next Indoor Worm Composting Workshop being held by the Lower East Side Ecology Center is on Tuesday, September 18, 2008 from 6 to 8pm at the Whole Foods (95 East Houston Street). There you can purchase a worm box with worms at a subsidized rate thanks to the Department of Sanitation. To RSVP, email info@lesecologycenter.org

~beth (Who wishes NYC would step it up like SF and have curb-side compost pick ups...)

Feeling Small And Helpless? Read This.

I am finding it hard to generally function on a daily basis (not because I am staring down this ineffectual R.D. exam), but instead because I feel like the choices I am making are not impacting the world, or more specifically, the environment. I'm in no way a dirty hippie, but I grew up on a nonworking farm where we did not waste water or food or electricity, where we grew a majority of what we ate, and we composted and recycled. Now I live in the city where people lap the block in their cars for status in a city with a subway, there is a litter of water and other bottles on each corner, and chicken bones regularly crunch under your feet if you don't look down when you walk down my block. A stark comparison, yes, but it does at least make me feel like I should be doing more to make up for it. This, of course, makes me want give a wake up call to everyone around me, but apparently American society at large does not care so much.

So here's is a topic from an organic nutrition standpoint that the average person might want to check out and ultimately the to help make a dent. You cannot live without it...

Water! Yes, we all know we need water to live, but if any of you heard any statistics this past March 22, aka World Water Day, you might tighten up that two shower a day policy, turn the water off when brushing your teeth, and generally stop watering/washing everything in sight. One of the biggest consumer impacts you could make would be to stop buying so much bottled water. The other day I was picking up some necessities at my local Tarjay and the woman in front of me in line was going on and on about how the case of "baby" water bottles she was purchasing was the cutest thing she'd ever seen. Really? That's the capstone? She's right, those bottles are probably way cuter than all those African kids with the swollen malnutrition bellies and flies on their faces who have no water at all. Well played, Tarjay lady. Yes, I did see her loading her plastic shrine into an SUV five minutes later, but I digress.

Here are some facts about her precious bottled water: "A person can live weeks without food, but only days without water. A person needs 4 to 5 gallons of water per day to survive. The average American individual uses 100 to 176 gallons of water at home each day, and the average African family uses about 5 gallons of water each day." Yes, we concede the body needs water, but does it need that mountain of plastic that seems to go along with it? Due to our addiction to bottled water, 38 billion bottles a year end up in landfills. I guess they're not so cute when they're empty, huh? Get a reusable bottle and find something other than the fact that your water came from Fiji to get psyched about already. And just because you have access does not mean you should abuse it, and in that vein, that you always will have access. Take the minute and a half to figure out how much you're using, then make an active decision to use less.

Another huge consumer impact is made when you choose not to purchase meat. Fast food companies and meat lobbyists pay billions of dollars a year to keep y'all yearning for meat, but frankly, it shouldn't be what's always for dinner. Digestive purposes aside, the fact that it takes the farmed animal industry approximately 5,000 gallons of water to produce one pound of meat and only 25 pounds to produce one pound of wheat is a hard one to stomach. You don't even have to think animals are cute or that they feel pain or have feelings to wrap your brain around that one. That means you could in theory, eat one pound of meat or have a year's worth of showers. And then if you push one step further and take into account that it averages approximately 13 pounds of wheat or grain to produce one pound of edible beef (not bone), your mind might explode. I know what I'd pick...a lot less meat in my diet.

Even if you cannot give up meat completely, you certainly can choose to eat less of it, just think how logically thirst-quenching it could be. That would be way more water you could drink from your tap instead of from a plastic bottle. Because if you are still going to choose to eat anything it is going to have to be farmed on land not filled with plastic bottles... See, this is how all the dots can be connected and I can make myself feel once again as though my personal choices have an impact, as would everyone else's. Enough for now, my high horse and I are thirsty.

~beth