Worm Casting Product question

After buying and screening a small bit of "pure worm casting" plus egg material, I was surprised to see numerous small sticks of wood. Is it likely that the bin this came from was not fully composted yet?

Am I overreacting?

These sticks are still solid, meaning that I can't crush or break them, even if I try strongly.

Most of the balls break down, but is it my misunderstanding of what pure worm casting plus eggs is?

Is this what you would expect?  Would you try the company again in the thought this was an anomaly?

The sticks are clearly not pure worm castings. I would ask the company if they think it's an anomaly. It would also depend on how it was sold and what I received? If I bought 5 kg and received 5.5, then I'd figure they do that on purpose to make sure I got what I paid for and the extra is just extra.

Christopher Weeks wrote: If I bought 5 kg and received 5.5, then I'd figure they do that on purpose to make sure I got what I paid for and the extra is just extra.

Bought 40 pounds, and weighing it is an interesting thought, and thank you for the reply..... Having already scooped some into compost tea before I screened any, this wouldn't be accurate for my use.

The bag also doesn't say anything about any additional bits or bops. Thinking that this might be an anomaly, I chose not to share the company name.  The owner might be in these forums.

Well you can still just ask them about it. That's the only way to both learn what the deal is and give them the chance to either explain or make things right.

And just for a different perspective, I know that if I was the maker/vendor of the product, I'd welcome any threads created on any good, related websites to discuss my product. It gets the name out and gives me a chance to find new customers.

The company that sold this got back to me, and had nothing but excuses saying that I don't understand the terminology.  The company claims that these sticks are worm egg material ,which I think is fraudulent.

They even state what the worm egg material is on the bag, that it is just little balls that look like dirt.  Nowhere do they say that work bedding will be included.

They even told me this worm egg material is 25 percent of the bag.  One would think they would have an accurate description, and not say that sticks are worm egg material.  I told them that worm eggs are a physical organic entity, and saying that sticks are worm.egg material is quite creative.  

Told them that sticks are clearly worn bedding material, and they said that since the same size, they can't be screened out.  You would think their label would state this.

I was wondering if it was an issue with the sifting process. I'd imagine it would take a lot to physically separate out bedding chunks from worm eggs because it would be difficult to automate.

A bit disappointing if you were expecting a purer product for sure.

In the vermiposting community, worm eggs are called cocoon and contain many eggs. They are lighter brown than the castings and about the size of sesame seeds. I gave few of any sticks in my vermipost and so just see them loose when I screen the bedding which is shredded cardboard and coconut coir.

Time to sift through another container worth of wiggle worm vermicompost.  The first scoop found a 2.5 inch stick.

I am classifying this with two different size classifiers, leaving me three different sizes of material.

Finished sifting, and was very surprised at some of the larger chunks. I expected all of the chunks to crush under my finger press, but one three inch nugget seems to be coco coir that is not broken down.  

The owner claims this is only things that can't be screened, and is worm egg material.  We have very different definitions of what should be screened out.

Sifted a third container this morning, and the large particles contain more coir looking material and large sticks.  The clumps suggest that this material added was not sifted prior to bagging.  This is very horrible quality of you are expecting only worm casting and worm egg material.  

Even the small particles have a bunch of sticks, much more than I would expect.

Just sifted a fourth box, that I submit for your opinion.

The research continues on a second bag of wiggle worm pure castings plus worm egg material.  My thought is possibly the first bag was an anomaly.  Let's see what I find.

There are a number of large clumps and sticks again.  This is just the first container sifted, but so far it looks the same as my first bag.

I have been thinking about my conversation with the owner, and at no time did he even suggest that the bag was worse than normal.  Perhaps they are very accustomed to these type of concerns.  

Container 2 of bag 2 proves to me that this company has problems.  I had seen several rocks in the first container, but set them aside for the second container.  

This shows a large number of rocks, when there should be none.

My guess is that this company outsources worm bins to different providers, and they have different procedures.

I definitely do not think the company would say that worm egg material includes rocks, but they surprised me saying that sticks were.

Be careful, and check your supplies.

Container 3 had 60 rocks in it.

This is not an exaggeration, and one of them is quite sizeable.

Remember the owner of the company said that none of this stuff can be screened away from the eggs.  

It is my opinion that either their incompetence adds this foreign material, or they do it to expand their profit.  Rocks are going to weigh significantly more than castings.

Now I wonder how and why someone with a worm farm might be adding rocks.  Perhaps they are scaping the ground, but this would be really odd for an industrial manufacturer of worm castings.

Container 4 has another 55 rocks in it.