Worm world

One, two, three... I saw the squirrels fly by our compost bin on the edge of the woods. Automatically my counter clicked on. Four, five, six... twenty-one, twenty-two... except

Those couldn't be squirrels. Their tails were not fluffy and hairy... but long and thin. Yuck! Rats! We had a rodent invasion of our compost bin about three years ago. We disassembled the composter to find they had chewed into the plastic container and were feasting on our vegetable scraps. We'd avoided fats, meats, and animal products like we're supposed to. But they had found us and that day I saw twenty-eight healthy and huge rats streak by, ten feet from our deck.

Needless to say, we have disposed of our compost in other ways. Recently we got an Omega Vert juicer, which leaves us with a lot of fairly dry pulp. I'd gathered some in our kitchen compost pail and was puzzling what to do with it. With so much wildlife in the woods near the house, I'd rather the raccoons and other small animals forage on other people's handouts.

Worms? Of course. I'd read about under-the-sink bins, so we tossed some Freecycle.org red crawlers into the kitchen bin, and - well, we'll see. Supposedly they stay where the food is, and are not smelly. I would love some black compost for my houseplants when I refresh the pots in spring. A new magazine, The Urban Gardener, reinforced what the classic Mother Earth has said over the years, "Start small. Do something." This is something. And it's small. Besides, it takes me back to childhood when I loved to play with earthworms in Mom's garden.

Got a small project that helps you care for the Seattle environment? We'd love inspiration!

Source:blog.seattlepi.com/