r/Vermiculture • u/alwaysonautopilot • 3d ago
Worm party Freezing scraps
Effective is not even the word for it!
In my experience with composting, I have thrown in scraps as they have been cut in the kitchen, put scraps into a blender and turn it into a smoothie, and then recently got into freezing.
I knew, from cooking defrosted chicken, that if the meat isn't prepared properly, it can go dry because the cellular structure of the food bursts when the water inside is frozen (expands) and all that water runs out during defrosting.
I felt like doing an experiment. I took two fresh discs of butternut, put one in the fridge overnight (left), and the other in a freezer (right). I put them both in the bin the next morning.
Pic 1. Monday morning
Pic 2. Thursday morning. By the time of taking this picture, the worms were having a feast and had eaten their way through the disc.
If you have freezer space, this is the way to go.
86
u/PopcornandComments 3d ago
Thank you for sharing this. I love a good experiment with instant results.
22
u/MysteriousTooth2450 2d ago
We do this to our scraps too. They definitely prefer the food thatās been frozen first. Cool experiment!
12
0
9
8
u/younamehere 2d ago
This is a dope and clear AB test! We have a deep freezer and lean towards freezing mainly bc weāre too lazy then to constantly be adding to our worm bin so we just take weekly batches to the bin. Freezing also helped prevent things getting gross before taking them to the bin so this post is very reassuring thanks!
7
u/hedgewomble 3d ago
Oh wow! We have three freezers so will definitely find space to do this with my scraps š
6
u/westchesteragent 2d ago
Added bonusā¦ the more stuff you have in your freezer the more efficiently it coolsā¦as long as you arenāt blocking vents of course! Thermal mass op!!
2
u/many_grapes 2d ago
Why do worms like the burst (frozen) food more? I am not understanding. This is the opposite of what my gut would think. Would anyone be kind enough to explain?
4
u/alwaysonautopilot 2d ago
The food is not damaged. in the same way it is not damaged for you or me when we take food out of the freezer to defrost for our own eating needs. I just see it as almost a pre digestion stage. Nutrient value remains bar any normal freezer damage, seen as a standard trade-off for keeping food frozen.
3
u/many_grapes 2d ago
Well freezer burn certainly degrades the quality of a lot of food for me, I assumed it might have a similar effect for animals. Predigestion makes sense though! Thank you for taking the time to explain.
15
u/MercuryTattedRachael 2d ago
Alton Brown had an episode (old) on Good Eats where he talks about strawberries. If you freeze strawberries, they defrost and are mushy. It's because natural ice crystals form and puncture cell walls. It doesn't mean the strawberry is bad, just that it's mushy. An alternative is to use dry ice to freeze because it's a flash-freeze and the crystals don't have time to form and puncture cell walls.
Essentially, the frozen items get "mushed" in the freezing process, making it easier for breakdown and the food gets taken more quickly.
Hope this helps!
2
u/many_grapes 2d ago
It does help! And I love Alton Brown so I will try to seek out that episode. Thanks for the information! It still disagrees with my own personal food preferences but hey, I am not a worm in a compost heap so I canāt complain. Have a good day!
5
u/EndOne8313 2d ago
Worms don't have teeth. They can only consume the vegetables once they have begun to break down. The freezing of fresh fruits and vegetables breaks the cell walls so when they defrost they're mushy.
3
3
u/wettale1234 2d ago
My neighbors keep a compost container in their freezer until itās full and they give it to me, at which point I add it to my system. I will probably use their stuff with my in-bed compost ditches if the worms like it so much
2
2
u/Big-Draft66 2d ago
Yes I started doing this too! I have a big container I keep in the freezer for this, I put all my kitchen scraps in it and when it's full I put it all in my bin and after a week or two it's time to feed again! The amount I put in would take probably more than a month to get eaten if it wasn't frozen, so definitely a good hack!
2
2
2
u/madre-de-los-gatos 1d ago
I started keeping my kitchen composting bin in the freezer because it kept getting really yucky before I would have a chance to take it out to my worm bin. Keep my food scraps in the freezer and itās all good. And then I found out it actually helps them to break down faster in the compost bin, which is perfect.
1
u/OddAd7664 2d ago
Any issues with mites or pot worms?
3
u/MercuryTattedRachael 2d ago
Mites will always appear eventually, as they can arrive embedded in cardboard, and other items. So it's okay to have the mites, but I keep a check on them and bait them out when I see a LOT (to me, a LOT means they're on all active feeding pieces. I don't want a colony, for sure.
Mites will always go towards the newest feeding and they love the sugars. I've seen them mostly on banana peels, and I give a broken grape or two (all pre-frozen). The mites go to the grapes first, and if I see one absolutely covered in mites, I grab it and put in a plastic bag and dispose of them, just to keep the population at a manageable level.
1
u/Joel748 20h ago
I sprinkled some diatomaceous earth on them. Will it affect the worms?
1
u/MercuryTattedRachael 20h ago
DE only kills mites when it is dry. The moment it absorbs moisture from your compost or bedding, it clumps together and loses its ability to slice exoskeletons.
Baiting them is so easy. Take a piece of bread and lay it directly over the feeding area where the mites are (on top of the bedding is just fine). I usually add two smashed grapes on top as well. Leave it for 24 hours, come back and check the bread. If there aren't as many on the bread as you'd like to remove, leave for another 24 hours. You can then dispose of them outside or put in a Ziploc bag and throw away. Wear gloves just to be safe (they aren't chigger mites, so they won't harm you, but you also don't want them traveling outside the bin).
DE can dry out your bin, and although it won't directly kill the worms, it can dry them out and that can lead to loss.
Hope that helps! You didn't do anything bad, but I'd keep an eye on the moisture level. š
-12
u/Compost_Worm_Guy 2d ago
The amount of energy needed to freeze something just to have it defrosted and eaten by worms...
Have you all lost your mind?
12
u/Unfair_Tangerine_217 2d ago
Right, because OP got a new freezer just for this.
-3
u/Compost_Worm_Guy 2d ago
Right. Cause you want to misunderstand
3
u/Unfair_Tangerine_217 2d ago
Nah, don't throw the ball back. See, this is what eventually happens with self-righteous people like you. If we don't do the thing exactly like you think it's correct, then it's better not done at all because it's somehow wrong or outright evil.
Happens with vegans.
Happens with animal rights activists.
Happens with young liberals.
And hell yeah it happens with sustainable lifestyles like composting.
Not all people adhering to those values do this, of course. But eventually the comments like yours come up.
Let people be. OP is composting. They're doing it well. If they use electricity or whatever in the process, it's up to them, and definitely not your business. You'd absolutely scare people away rather than accept that they don't do it your way.
To end this rant, I'd also like to point out you have no idea what OP's setup is. Freezing/blending scraps makes the process way faster, and that's crucial if you live in an apartment or a small house. I'd rather compost more and use a bit of electricity than to have to throw my scraps away because my worms can't eat them fast enough.
11
u/BenThereNDunnThat 2d ago
It's a freezer that's already running.
The incremental increase in energy usage while removing the heat from the worm food is miniscule.
My chest freezer uses about 750 watts a day. Opening it and adding room temperature worm food to it would only increase that to around 900 watts for the day before it's frozen and that worm food becomes part of the thermal mass and actually helps make the freezer more efficient.
Have you lost YOUR mind?
2
u/dwnsougaboy 2d ago
The Watt is not a unit that includes time. Thus the need to use Wh or kWh in this context to be meaningful.
1
u/BenThereNDunnThat 2d ago
Fine, since you can't do the math on your own:
0.9 kWh/day (on the day the worm food is added)
0.75 kWh/day (average on all other days)
0.15 additional kWh used due to putting the worm food in.
My power company charges $0.38/kWh.
Therefore, putting the additional stuff in the freezer theoretically costs me about 5.7 cents.
I say theoretically, because I have solar and haven't paid the power company a penny in 5 years. So, for me, it costs nothing. For other in my high electric cost state it's about 5.7 cents. It's probably a bit more in California and Hawaii, a bit less in most other states.
0
u/Compost_Worm_Guy 2d ago
Clearly you need to read up on Physics and energy states before we can start the Diskussion of my mind and its education.
1
u/meeps1142 2d ago
Freezers with more contents are more energy efficient than half empty ones.
It literally saves energy to add more to your freezer.
6
u/Haulbignuts 2d ago
The amount of energy needed to grow most of the processed food today, yes we're out of our minds.
4
u/phonefellin_lakeerie 2d ago
Donāt even need processed food. Growing whole foods is astronomically energy intensive
-3
u/Compost_Worm_Guy 2d ago
Yes. But that energy is necessary and is used by the eater. Why would we use energy to feed worms??
6
u/spaetzlechick 2d ago
Kills bugs too. Iāve never had flies or gnats because I freeze everything. Also easier to portion out food for my worms through the winter when I have less fresh waste coming from my gardens.
-1
u/Compost_Worm_Guy 2d ago
Sure thats nice. Must be worth the wnergy used then. Nice things are always worth it
37
u/Longjumping_Home2963 2d ago
the meltwater is the one catch, it all comes out at once so id thaw them in a colander first or throw a handful of shredded cardboard in with them, otherwise the bin goes soggy fast. nice that you actually did a side by side, most of us just swear by it with zero proof :)