Got the trophy skeeters up there, huh? heh… I lived in SW Montana and what they lacked in size they made up in numbers. boy… I don’t miss them.
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i guess nitrogen should be up there too…
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The cicadas in the Ohio valley are crazy you can’t even sit on the porch and talk they get so loud. I think they will be out next year in my area but it’s hard to keep track of the last time was. We should be due I’m gonna have to try some organic practice and try and utilize a natural resource gotta be a good source of calcium and microbes I would think.
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I was at the pet store getting some activated carbon to recharge my carbon filter with today and I saw microbial charges of nitrifying bacteria to fight ammonia build up in aquarium water. Are you familiar with this I would think it would be a excellent tea addition or a soil treatment. It sounds possible that could be a great addition of a soil microbes that helps production of nitrogen for plants but IDK.
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Yup practically the same thing as insect fraas from my under standing … the Rollie pollies love my worm bins if some happen to die in there there’s one more addition to have in the mix of great soil!
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Compost question- I have my worm bin in a 20 gal fabric pot, its just bedding, select food scraps, cannabis scraps, and the worms.
I have a big compost bin outside thats just 3 pallets screwed together so the compost sits on the ground. Its mostly last fall’s leaves, shredded with my lawnmower. I give it the rest of our family’s food scraps and mostly vegetable garden waste and the occasional bag of grass clippings. I keep a thermometer in it and it really stays close to air temp so its not thermal composting.
There are a TON of worms in this bin! Some from me tossing used soil last year that I had worms in, and the big fat ones must have come out of the ground. But i turned that pile over a few weeks ago and the numbers were just crazy!
So now my question- I see a lot of others say they feed compost to their worms, but since my yard bin is really just a big worm compost pile- I shouldnt be thinking about adding that compost to my other worm bin thats fed mostly coffee grounds and things they eat fast like fruit, should I? Because once finished the material in the uard bin is already worm compost? What about moving that yard/leaf compost into the fabric pot worm bin before its fully broken down?
Or should I be thinking about adding more nutrients and green matter to the yard pile to get it to cook and shift to thermal compost rather than vermi? Seems like a waste to me, what do y’all think?
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Congratulations you have two working worm bins then worms will go through your yard waste Bin just like it was just another contained bin but the down side is their not contained make for a more difficult time to capture them and transfer them but you may not want to anyways worms will probably eat weed seed and such so it’s up to you you can take a load of the yard bin and throw it in another fabric pot and you have more than enough to start another heard as for hot composting I’d leave that one alone and just start again if ya have the material on hand compost needs a blend of green and brown material and size to heat up properly to kill weed seed a minimum of 130* for 4 days will kill seeds they are a bit of work But not bad though it needs the right moisture And turning occasionally max temp should not be over 160* though 130-155 is ideal if your pushing over 160 it needs turned and cooled and more browns added if to low more green is needed it’s the N in greens that get you temps up! Browns bring it down.
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That’s what I’m about to do know in my grow journal I have an empty bin waiting for compost, the compost just serves as bedding material which they eat anyways I don’t feed much kitchen stuff other than the cucumbers or salad that goes bad in the house .
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So let’s say you have all the freshly cut grass to make a bin and last year’s leaves and debris I lasagna layer my brown and greens water and a hand full of dirt green:brown ratio say 1 inch of grass to 4 inches of leaves is about the right combo to heat up 30:1 is about ideal for bin heating all organic material has ratio of c:n numbers for like instance wood chips have like 300 C value so it will take considerably more N to break them down
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It has been about 17 years since the last ridiculous one I remember all summer long that’s all you heard and there shells we’re all over the trees
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They were saying that they were going to be overwhelming this year.
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Looks like you have your hands full! Keep up the good works! 
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Some Sebring’s Revenge or earth lover. Leaning on SR but could be wrong, kinda forgot what seed I popped 
Has a fruity/artificial grape smell with a mild pine/fuel/sweat in the back. Pretty impressed with the quality considering it’s grown in a solo cup in the understory of my plants during veg strength lights. If I would have put in the effort I’m sure this plant would have looked much nicer but not bad for ~200 umols at the canopy for most of the grow.
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My only suggestion is that when it’s all done, get a ~$20 test to see what nutrition is in it. That way if your mix is already high in, let’s say potassium, and your compost is high in potassium, you’ll know it needs to be offset.
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You’re saying get my soil and compost tested? You mean just a standard npk soil test?
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Yes. It’s never a bad idea to have some general idea about the nutrient quantities in your soil/compost.
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There are several different types. Magicicadas emerge every 17 years. Other types emerge on other time frames.
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5 yearling squirrels have decided to live in our giant Fir tree, so I made them feeders and sleeping boxes.
The plants are all doing well and we should have lot of seeds to give away come Fall !!
My black runner duck hatchlings arrive by air mail later this week, so I’ll upload some photos when they arrive. After 2 seasons of getting swarmed by slugs I was done messing with them. The ducks will be on a search and devour mission!
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@Sebring would you be interested in some carebears f7? I think that’s the gen They are
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