Worm Depository 12/06

When I went behind my favorite coffee house today to collect grounds from garbage bin, there was only one small bag, not the numerous bags that I have come to expect. I went inside to ask for grounds. The young girl apologetically told me that the manager had told her that no one wanted coffee grounds in the winter and to throw them away and not save them in the barrel. She said that she told him there were people like me that used them even in the winter. She took my name and promised to talk to the manager abut saving them in the back as usual. I had wanted the coffee grounds to throw on the DMZ worm depository and compost pile at Dawn’s house since we had got a major load of wood chips dumped there and needed more nitrogen (grounds) to mix with them for compost. I went with my one small bag of coffee grounds to Dawn’s and still threw some wood chips, now covered with snow, on the piles. Winter Waste is just as valuable as summer waste.

For the second night we had some of the greens from the GP box in the sunroom in our salad. And for the second night in a row we had a delicious salad, if I need to say so myself. The salad greens in the GP Box are doing okay but not as well as I expected. I think I was focusing too much on the five-pane window inserts and not the growing. The temperature is not a problem. With an inserts the inside temperature in the sunroom stays about 20 degrees or more over the outside before the radiant heater needs to kick in. I think the lack of light might be a more significant factor. Unlike Colorado, here is in Wisconsin we do not get many sunny days in the winter. I do have a four-foot fluorescent growing light that I moved around over the box. Perhaps picking up another one at the Habitat Restore would be the least expensive way to grow more greens.

I thought of the lack of light because today was a sunny day. Everything in life feels better for me when the sun is out. Even the winter waste, coffee grounds and wood chips, were looking good.

I have been glad to see a discussion on the “sustainable” list server about more efficient use of fall leaves. The city now pays a company to collect them. The private waste group compost them during the winter and sells them to fertilizer makers like ‘Miracle-Gro”. I mentioned to the group that I was glad to hear that others were eyeing the value of leaves like I was. Now if lots of us collect our leaves and our neighbors and used them for compost, garden beds and such we will not only save money for the city but keep the leaves from being ‘infected’ with chemicals rather than mixed with other waste and enriched by worms to make the “black gold” of growing power. A quote of Gandhi comes to mind:

“The daily waste, judiciously composted, returns to the soil in the form of golden manure causing a saving of millions of rupees and increasing manifold, the total yield of grains and pulses. In addition, the judicious use of waste keeps the surroundings clean. And cleanliness is not only next to godliness, it promotes health”

Now Gandhi was talking about cow waste, manure, but the same thought can be applied to all waste, leaves and winter waste.

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