jonro37

Has anyone tried redworms for organic fertilization and under soil insect control?

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farmergiles

Worm castings make excellent fertiliser. Some people run worm farms for this purpose.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by soil insect control.

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jonro37

Im growing in a soil/compost mixture with goat manure mixed, but since I let her veg a while. I think she has utilized most of the goat manure so I wanted to keep organic but add some fertilizer so I thought redworms= castings; add a few worms. Maybe they would eat the larve of any pest that might get in too.

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Roach

they are earthworms.

their poop is good for plants.

the only pest they might eat would be some fungus gnats.

I think you'd have to watch which ferts you use when using worms.

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jonro37

They are in there (2) in a 3.5 gallon container, we will see lol.. probably never know the difference though

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Roach

I'd go as high as ten "night crawlers" of even more regular earth (fishing) worms.

they do not harm roots..

...sorry for the names, I'm an old country boy.

keep an eye on the amount of any manures you use, some can be pretty "hot" (very very high in nitrates),,,,as it seems you are.

a farmer needs to know his poops.

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Galt

Since most of the insect pests begin their life cycle in the soil, you're definitely on the right track. Don't know the specifics of your grow but you can water in beneficial nematodes. They are little tiny, almost microscopic worm critters that live in the soil and eat all kinds of pests in their early stages of development. I'm a little foggy on the names and specifics, but there's one type that lives in the top most 4-6" strata, and another strain that lives below that down to about 12-15" I believe. I would imagine that soil pH and tilthe will effect gas exchange and the overall health of the nematodes, but I have had pretty great results incorporating them in my organic veg and fruit tree trials. I apologize that I also can not recall where I found them, but I would not buy them from anyone who wasn't familiar with the fact that there are different types that favor differing depths.

Nematodes

Generally speaking I would never counsel using any straight manure. I always compost for a year just to make sure it isn't too nitrogen hot. Any worm is going to aid sub-soil aeration and tilthe, which is one of the most oft overlooked areas of soil growing. This is also why the broad fork has found so much favor vs. traditional tilling among organic gardeners, since it allows you to loosen the soil without destroying its structure. Tilling kind of ruins all of the fine work that the worms have done.

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