Composting

[mhoppe2]

I started a compost pile last spring and now have hundreds of worms living in it. Is this a good thing? If I want to use the composted material for indoor plants how do I get rid of the worms first?

[Newt]

Hi Mhoppe,

The worms are good.* They digest organic material and their 'waste', called castings, is very good for your plants.* To remove the worms from your compost you can 'sift' the soil with some type of screen that you can make or purchase.* You may even have something that can be used such as a minnow bucket.* Screen that is used for windows would be too fine, but you can find 'hardware cloth' in hardware stores that you can purchase in just about any size with different sized holes. * Something with 1/4" holes or a little smaller would be good.* Click on 'soil sifters' below for pics and sites you can look at.

*soil sifters

Here's an example of one you can purchase.
http://backyardgardener.com/gp/Garde...st_Sifter.html

Newt

[backyardgardener]

Great question.* I would assume the you have more outdoor compost versus the indoor containers.* The volume of your indoor pots shouldn't be that large.

I would make some fun out of it.* See if your kids or grand kids would like to help you explore what's in the compost and see if they will help you pull the worms to be returned back to the compost.

Recipe of using compost as a potting soil is to use one part compost to two parts garden soil.

Backyard