Cover Bin surface with leaves
Surface Cover
By covering the surface of your bin with some kind of moisture barrier - to slow evaporation - you’ll keep your bin at at a more optimal moisture level . Cardboard sheets & old carpet serve this purpose, but I’ve found that a 1-2 inch layer of leaves works best.
The leaves decompose & are eaten by the worms. As food, this is a much preferable to the glue in corrugated cardboard or the chemicals in carpet. And they love to hang out under this layer. During a hard rain, even though my bin is protected from the rain, many worms would crawl up onto the top edge of the bin. Since I’ve added the leaf layer, they don’t do this nearly as much.
i’m in the desert
are my leaves ok
mesquite,,,palo verde,,,euclaptus,,,pepper tree,,oleander
tom mendola
9 Jun 09 at 3:06 pm
Tom, Palo Verde leaves are good, but don’t use any leaves with aromatic oils. Here’s an article citing a University of Arizona study finding that the toxins in Eucalyptus and oleander leaves are harmless after being composted in a “really hot” compost pile. So according to that, you could use them after they’ve been cooked. But personally, I wouldn’t risk it. You can also use straw.
admin
9 Jun 09 at 8:12 pm