Residential

You may remember way back to our Autumn 2024 newsletter when I composed “Small Space, Big Impact: Urban Composting”. In that article I shared a brief overview of a couple common composting practices. That article didn’t mention it, but I was simultaneously starting my own journey with vermicomposting at my home in Mansfield, on my front porch. I purchased roughly 1,000 worms (~1lb) and set up my Worm Factory 360, shown on the right. Everything seemed to be going smoothly until the very next morning I discovered every single one of my worms had escaped. Little did I know that I missed a crucial first step that would ensure my failure. I’m going to use this article to provide some basic information on vermicomposting and point out some tips I’ve learned along the way.

Losing my first batch of worms was a letdown because not only was I looking forward to composting, but I had also invested a lot of money in this. In 2025, one pound of worms is approximately $50.00 plus tax and shipping. Some friends and family have asked me, “Sam, why don’t you just dig up some worms in your yard and use those?”, to which I respond only a small number of worms are useful for composting. The Rodale Institute states that typical earthworms are soil dwelling, don’t process large amounts of food waste and don’t reproduce well in confined spaces. The most commonly used worms for composting are Eisenia fetida, referred to as Red Wigglers. According to Rodale Institute, red wigglers are preferred because they have a quick reproduction cycle, feed near the surface of their substrate and are communal, meaning they don’t mind sharing living space with others. These worms are also rapid feeders; under ideal conditions a colony can recycle half their weight in food scraps daily (NCSU).

So where did I go wrong and what have I learned? Well, the biggest issue with my first batch of worms was improper acclimation to their new home. After setting up my bin, I closed the lid and walked away. I should have placed the open bin under an artificial light source for 24-48 hours. NCSU states that worms have a distaste for light and will tunnel into their substrate when light is present. Introducing light in those critical first couple of days teaches the worms to burrow downwards and explore their new space. I also went quite light on substrate; worms need space to move around and explore so loosely fit as much substrate as possible in your given container. So, with a few lessons learned I decided to buy another thousand worms and give it another go. At the time of this writing, I am about a month in, and it is going very well! I am feeding the worms kitchen scraps about once a week. So far, their feedings have consisted of eggs shells, used coffee grounds, carrots, various potatoes, blueberries, strawberries, celery, zucchini, squash, and green beans. I freeze my food scraps for a few days before feeding to help break down cell walls for quicker recycling. In these early stages it’s critical to temper your expectations; not every single scrap is going to be able to make it into your bin. Make sure the previous week’s feeding has been mostly consumed before adding in another. One could start with more worms for faster composting and the ability to compost more items at a time as well. Also remember that what you put into your compost is what you’re going to get out of it.

It feels great to be keeping these scraps out of the landfill and I’ve truly noticed a decrease in how much rubbish we are setting out at the curb each week. I never realized how much we were throwing away until I started collecting it. I’m also really looking forward to having some fresh “black gold” for the garden and all our various houseplants. Composting is something my son is interested in as well and it’s been a fun bonding experience for us both. I think it’s important to get the kids to think about conservation early and this is a perfect way to do that. Thanks for reading this far and stay tuned to our newsletter for future updates on my composting journey!

Learn More!

• Earthworm Composting – NC State Extension
• Vermicomposting for Beginners – Rodale Institute

Summer and fall are the perfect time to start preparing the land you’re considering changing to native wildlife cover. Whether you’re converting an old crop field or a turf grass/ lawn conversion, let’s discuss how to get the most from your planting.

Agricultural field conversions are easiest to complete due to the weed bed being suppressed for food production, and post-harvest you’re planting in a rather clean seed bed. Fields coming out of soybeans are the ideal landscape to plant in. If coming out of corn, fodder may need to be raked and baled off for adequate seed to soil contact.

Lawn conversions require a bit more site preparation than agricultural field conversions due to the aggressive nature of turf style grasses. Mow and allow the vegetation to grow back at least 6 inches. Then follow up with multiple blanket-herbicide applications, one application in the fall and spring are necessary to kill off the current cover. There are other methods for terminating grass cover currently established on the site if herbicides are something you’d like to steer away from, but each method has its own drawbacks on the environment and your planning timeline. Repeated tillage, solarization via black plastic and putting the parcel into a crop rotation for a few years are options as well.

When planting native stands, you can either drill in the seed or broadcast it across the surface of the soil. When drilling, ensure you’re using a Great Plains, native, no-till grass drill as native seed needs planted no more than 1/8 – ¼ inch below the soil surface. In my professional opinion, using a drill is most effective during the spring planting time frame, whereas broadcasting is most efficient in the dormant frost seeding season. By broadcasting seeds in the dormant season, we are able to mimic processes that occur in nature. The best time to broadcast seeds in this time frame is after a light snow. This way you’re able to see the seed as it’s placed across the landscape, ensuring an even rate of coverage. Set your broadcast spreader to ½ the recommended rate per acre and complete two passes, perpendicular to one another, for the most even coverage. When seeding native species, the planting windows are as follows: spring season (Mid-March – June 1) and the dormant season (December – Mid-March). Plating oats with the native seed is a great way to control soil stability in the first year of growth in the stand while native plants focus on their complex root structure.

In the first growing season of the stand’s life, multiple growing season mowings will need completed at a height of 10-15 inches. These mowings will reduce the completion the forbs receive from the grasses and allow for a more even mix in the stand. After the first year of establishment, full stand mows should never be completed, and a long-term adaptive maintenance plan should be generated and followed.

Once your stand is an established grassland, maintenance is required. Historically, nature did this for us, but human intervention has allowed many of our natural grass spaces to revert to early successional woodland habitat. The best tool for maintaining grassland habitat is prescribed burns done on 3–5-year return intervals. This will remove the thatch layer from the previous year’s growth as well as kill off any woody vegetation that may have infiltrated the stand. Spring burns encourage native grass growth whereas fall burns tend to generate more forbs or wildflowers in subsequent years. A good goal to keep in mind is to keep ½-2/3 of the stand standing entering each dormant season to provide continued resources and habitat for wildlife. Cycle through the field and by year 2-3, the field should have gone through a completed management round, and it is time to repeat.  

Burns can be hard to accomplish with so much red tape in the way, lack of personnel and climatic conditions (i.e. draught) so utilizing mowing and tillage for management is a great alternative. Mowing for stand management should be completed after the primary grassland bird nesting season, March 1 – July 15. I encourage mowing management to be completed by mid to late August to allow for regrowth and better over winter habitat for wildlife and pollinators. Mowing maintenance should take place on 1/3 of the acreage and be cycled through similar to fire management. Depending on how much thatch accumulates on the stand, raking this cut vegetation may be necessary to avoid smothering desired growth and retain access to the bare soil.

Disking is also an excellent tool for creating additional bare ground in a dense stand, as bare ground is part of a pristine habitat for both wildlife and pollinators, and tillage helps rejuvenate the seed bed and allows annuals to flush out again. Be cautious of disking in areas with a history of invasive and noxious weeds, as disking will expose the existing seed bed and allow room for these unwanted species to take off. If this happens, don’t worry. Reach out to your local conservation office and we can help solve the issue, though following up with the establishment mowings during that following growing season is a great place to start to reduce annuals appearing in the plot. Some landowners are interested in the addition of food plots or shelterbelts near or adjacent to their grassland stands, which we can discuss more in another article.

For more information on establishing native cover reach out to Rachel Coy.

With extremely hot weather and heavy rapid rains ponds can get stressed due to the potential for the water column to flip and/or an influx of nutrients from nearby properties. As a result, you might see rapid water level increases and algae or aquatic plants growing. These things may cause an oxygen depletion in the water column and could cause a fish kill.

So, the question then becomes how do we fix some of these things? Algae blooms are driven by high nutrient loads within ponds which come from leaves, grass clippings, fertilizers and other material deposited into your pond. While a little bit of this material, commonly known as muck, is normal and can be broken down within the aquatic ecosystem, too much of it can be harmful. How do you tell if you have too much muck in your pond? Simply by walking around the inside edge of your pond! Pay attention to how much you sink into the inky black material and how it envelopes your feet and legs. The deeper you sink, the more of this highly nutritious, nutrient laden muck your pond has. The best way to help your pond digest muck is by adding beneficial bacteria, which are live active bacteria that help break down the muck and restore the volume back in your pond. Often the more muck that is in the pond, the more treatments you will need which are generally completed in the spring and fall of the year. Pond aeration can also help by increasing oxygen levels and boosting bacterial activity.

For sparse rooting and floating aquatic vegetation adding species of fish like grass carp, tilapia (which will not over-winter in Ohio) or channel catfish that eat these plants will also restore volume to your pond. There are occasions where you may want to consider dredging your pond and we recommend that you contact a Richland SWCD technician who can help make recommendations. By increasing the volume and supplementing oxygen in the pond you will help make your investment not only look better but be more hospitable for the fish and other aquatic friends within. Some additional things you can do to help your pond is by leaving the grass taller around it to help filter out sediments and nutrients that could come in from overland flow. You can also utilize native switch grass plantings, often times marketed as ornamental grasses, in areas of high flow. In which they will help slow down water, increase water infiltration, and help reduce sediments and nutrients from overland flow.

Wet Spots and Your Property

Do any of these look familiar to you?

When it comes to wet spots in yards and fields there are options for landowners to improve drainage. Some options may be more appealing due to financial cost, topographic feasibility or personal capabilities. In no particular order things that homeowners can choose from are:

• Installing a tile to remove surface water if you have an area on your property that can allow it to drain without causing you additional issues.
• Installing a French drain to help with potentially excessive rainfall inundation.  
• Adding soil amendments like gypsum, perlite and organic matter
• Reshaping the low spot so that it has positive drainage.

These options can also help with areas that retain rainwater for long periods of time, we may recommend obtaining a soil test before selecting one of these potential solutions so that you get more bang for your buck. The Richland Soil and Water Conservation office can offer assistance over the phone but usually a site visit is recommended so that we can visually observe the entirety of your concern. Services like this are provided to the public for free.