Bruce Spierer

Chip can be great for worms if used properly. Worms won't breakdown fresh chip; they are happiest in partly decomposed material, and are often found in fall leaf litter. If you want to compost the chip then build your pile and add the worms the material begins to break down. You don't need to worry burning them because they will migrate throughout the pile and find cool pockets.

If you want to use the chip as mulch leave the chip in pile make sure it is moist and turn it a few times until it begins to breakdown, then add the worms.

It also depends on the type of worms you're using. Red wigglers are terrestrial and work horizontally, but they eat about 1/2 their body weight in two days. Earthworms work vertically and will dive deep into the soil, but they are much slower eaters.

If you are already doing vermicomposting on site chances are worms will find their way into the compost and woodchip piles over time.

I just completed my first phonebook grow, also inspired by this post. Thanks.

One problem I am having is fresh air exchange. As a result, most of my mushrooms are coming out very stemmy. I've found that the best conditions for the season are to keep them with the furnace, inside of a clear garbage bag that is propped up with some holes in it. I am misting it a few times a day. The problem is if I leave the bag open to encourage more air exchange everything dries out; if I close it more I get good fruiting but stemmy mushrooms.

I would like to avoid using perlite, simply to avoiding another input into the system. I am about to start fruiting another phonebook I innoculated, any suggestions to fix this problem would be great!

My parents have a small turf plot (about 10'x10') in front of their property which they no longer wish to care for and has been overgrown all season.  They were about to concrete it or get a fake replacement.  I offered to replace it with something low maintenance (no mowing).

I've been getting great design ideas from the forum, but I'm not quite sure how to approach removing the turf.  I would rather not dig up the entire plot since that is labor intensive and would disturb whatever ecosystem does exist (it was chemically treated for years but has had a break the last two seasons). 

What do I do with the existing lawn?  Also it is worth trying to seed winter rye to begin remediating the soil this late in the season (zone 6b) or should I just wait until next spring to begin?

Thanks