Quote:
Originally Posted by Lagniappe
Here's a question that I've pondered for some time: On a television program, this company was gathering food scraps from restaurant dumpsters to feed their worms. The scraps contained all types of bread, veggies,noodles and even meats. I thought these things would contain a lot of salts and produce a potentially toxic product for plants. Can these things be fed to worms to produce usable castings?
If so, there are bakery outlets here where hog farmers get truck loads of stale bread, I could certainly feed some worms with that.
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Yes, I feed mine stale or moldy bread. You just have to break it up, I rip it with my hands no big deal. I have found that Bagels are just way to thick and turn into a big clump which takes the worms a long time to break down. But keep in mind, you can not just feed the worms one type of food. With only bread will start to run and try to escape looking for food, or they will die off.
restaurant scraps work good, you just have to be a little picky about what they give you. You do not want anything that has been cooked already as it will contain butter, salt and other spices. Salt will dry your worms out and they will die. Meat is a no, no for worms and so is dairy, and acidic foods like cirtus and onions. How ever in moderation you can give them some just have to be careful that there is not to much vs worm population. I have a restaurant where I use to work many years ago, and the Kitchen manager gives me the outer leafs from their lettuce that they would normally toss, and I also grab any peppers or tomatoes that have gone bad. And they always have a large bin of pre mixed salad which has a holding time of 12 hours. Once this happens they have to toss it. I will take it when I can, and when I have space. Most common problem with worms is over feeding them. If there is more food then what they can eat you can created a bad habit for them. If you open your worm bin and it smells like anything other then dirt, or musty air you might have a problem. But as population grows you can throw more and more in there at once.