I'm becoming obsessed with worm castings.

[rprimbs]

When I tried gardening at my parents house -- over fifteen years ago -- I fertilized with free "manure".  And I used a tremendous quantity of it -- two to three large garbage cans full per fifteen foot row.  

The results were fantastic.  The tomato plants had the largest leaves I'd ever seen, and the yields of huge sweet fruit were unbelievable.  The watermelon were up to 35 pounds, and the sweetest best watermelon I'd ever tried.  The other melons, and squash were the same.

Years later I tried gardening at my own home in Escondido.  The farmer I had been getting the free cow manure from had stopped giving it away and started mixing it with soil and producing various composts for sale.  So I tried the $1 bagged compost from Lowe's and Home Depot.  Unlike the free "manure" this stuff smelled really bad, and the results were terrible.  I tried mushroom compost with similar poor results.

It dawned on me that the free manure had been absolutely full of worms.  You wouldn't have believed the amount of worms in it.  It was old, composted, and verv fine textured.  Now I am convinced that it was largely worm castings.

I am starting to think that worm castings are the miracle ingredient of good gardens.  I read that pure worm castings are the best for seeds starting, growing strawberries in, and "no till" gardening.  Which I am skeptical of because some of the really outstanding "no till" gardeners seem to like to dig a "comparison" bed next to the "no till" -- but "raised" -- bed, and then rotate the "no till" and comparison beds the next year.  And they use a huge amount of "compost" -- that is full of worms.  They add "Red Wiggler's" to the manure, and "Nightcrawlers" to the "compost".

I am going to build a large swallow "compost" bin about two meters by two meters with a wire mesh divider in the middle.  I will put free fresh manure in one side, let it compost, then get some Red Wiggler's. After a couple of months I will get more manure and fill the other side.  I will cover the worm side with plywood, to keep the birds out, and they can migrate to the other side when they are done with the composted manure.

[Moose]

Don't see a downside