Let's talk a little more about worms.

I know, this is the most boring topic to everyone except me, but I'm working hard to try to get more people to take it seriously.

Last we talked, I'd solarized a bunch of dirt and was on the look out for worms. Since then, I've come to the conclusion that they probably came in on the mulch I'd gotten last year as well as the topsoil I'd gotten this year. I've joined an online group of homeowners overrun with these things, trying experiments in control. I've done a lot of reading, and a lot of worm killing. It's not fun. I don't have exact numbers, but I've probably killed about a 750 worms since figuring out I had a problem, and that's just from the 3/4 acres I maintain around the house.

An average sized Jumping worm.

 

Because no one was really paying attention, these wriggly *ssholes have spread pretty far, pretty fast. Popular for fishing (because of their thrashing) they've gotten into the waterways and floated around. They've hitched rides in soil, mulch, on landscaper's machines, in shared and purchased plants; some people even wonder if they've tracked the cocoons in on the treads of their shoes. (The eggs, or cocoons, are only 2mm big, and look like dirt.) Some folks thought they were safe because they bought bagged products - but if they were stored on the ground, and there are worms on the ground and holes in the bags, there's worms in the bags. Note: Grab your bags from the tops of the stack, and ask if they've been treated to over 104*. If you can't find out that info, leave your bags out on the blacktop for a few really good sunny days. Clear bags work better than black for solarizing, come to find out.

The first batch of worms I hand picked out of my property (north of 300 worms) I tried to drown in water. It took over 24 hours for them to die. It was disturbing. Now I have a bucket into which I put 2" of icemelt and then layers of worms. They self-generated their own poisonous brew as they decomposed. This kills them in about a minute, but I'll warm you, it's gross. It doesn't stink so bad as the bucket of water, but it still has a smell.

A pile of worm castings (poop).

The "coffee ground/taco meat" effect of their castings en mass.

The crumbly results. This is washing down from above my house where I had a mulch bed.
This could be very bad news of the embankment behind my house lets go - the soil is already very shallow over the ledge.
The crumbling mess is a nightmare for shallow rooted plants. It also doesn't hold water. It's like pebbly silt.

I haven't done anything beyond solarizing where I could and hand-picking the adults where I find them. I've set up "worm traps"  - flat rocks in contact with the dirt with a little organic matter under it, or small sheets of cardboard with a rock on top to weigh it down. They seems to be drawn to glass clippings. I hate it - it makes my yard look like a mess. I've also tried "grunting" or "fiddling" for worms - where you take a notched stick and run another stick over it, sending vibrations into the ground. It drives the worms up, thinking they are escaping from moles.
Other folks are experimenting with just about everything you can imagine - diatomaceous earth, bio-char, alfalfa pellets, spent tea leaves, Irish Springs soap, funguses. Some folks are trying to limp their plants along by deep-mulching them in compost, but that also feeds the worms. Some people think it's best to try to starve them out. Other folks like me are just trying to pick them by hand, but it's a loosing battle. Some feed them to chickens - some chickens are freaked out by the snake-like movements and won't touch them, others love them. There's a lot of concern that the worms collect heavy minerals though, and that can be passed along to whatever eats the worms. (At this point only some chickens, moles and opossums appear to enjoy the worms.)
Folks are finally starting to pay more attention because this could directly impact the maple industry. Sugar maples are already at risk from the warming climate, and they do NOT like their roots exposed. People start to get serious when you threaten their pancakes. I know Cornell, UMASS and at least one school in Wisconsin are studying them in earnest.

So what can you do so that creatures from a horror movie don't invade your soil? You have to be careful. If you buy material/plants, ask if they know about jumping worms. Look at the top of the soil for the "Taco meat" castings. Knock off the dirt and wash the roots if you suspect worms. Wash off any equipment that had contact with soil. Wipe your feet. Wash your tools. Heck, I might get a deep boot tray and put a light bleach wash out on my porch for my shoes. Leave bagged material in the sun for a few days to solarize to over 104*.

Hope the smart folks come up with some sort of control for them soon.

Here's a short video about me scratching for worms. I'd already gone through and pulled 200+ worms out of this section a few weeks ago. (Sorry, it's hard to film with your left and grab worms with your right.) Toward the 50 second mark you'll see their creepy flippy maneuver - if they feel lightly threatened, they will poke their heads out and slither away. If they feel acutely threatened, they poke their butts out, and then do this flippy thing before slithering away. I think it's because they can detach their tail sections and use it as "bait".

Not much is new

 The weather got hot, and things around here slowed to a crawl. The bathroom guy, last I heard from him, is delayed (no big shock there.) I cut a few more holes in the ceiling of the bathroom before deciding to let the hired guns take care of the rest. I got the trim and door finished, and most of the hardware installed.

The first time they shipped my toilet. This is exactly how it looked when I opened the box.

The second time they shipped it. Crazy what an inner pack and some padding will do.
The second one was fine.

 

Other than that, it's just be a march of mowing the yard, picking bugs off my plants, and murdering jumping worms.
Oh yes, they are everywhere now.
I'm not 100% convinced that they only came in on the dirt. I'm now finding them everywhere I had spread mulch last year. The soil right below the mulch is grainy, like coffee grounds. Nothing wants to grow in it except other invasives.

In no particular order:

Chandos got a new sack of catnip.
She was thrilled.

I wound up working from my Sister's place for about a week.
I had had supervision.

We celebrated Mr Horse's birthday with a jelly donut. He loves jelly donuts.
He only gets one on his birthday.

Jewel weed, North America's native impatient, is in full bloom

Found some Ghost Pipes up in the woods.

Pulled some of the early potatoes. They did ok, considering the crappy July we had.

Jumping worm castings. All that pebbly poo is not a good sign.

It's a little hard to see here, but a big limb came off my Big Oak tree.

My tiny Zinnias are doing ok.

String beans are about the only thing I've gotten out of the garden in any quantity.

I went out to a public event, which was Super Weird. (And super geeky.)

I've played with my bees quite a bit. They seem to be doing well, but I don't know how much honey there will be for us humans. July was rough on them.

And I found a stick bug on my marigold. That was pretty neat.
I've seen a couple around here in the last few years.

My hope is that the bathroom guy can start soon. The roof stuff sort of needs to be done when it's not snowing.

The Bathroom - Tiles and Doors Edition

 Part of the bathroom reno is dealing with the tile.

I've removed all of the 50's era green tiles. The white 8" are still on the floor so I have somewhere clean to walk. They will be removed and replaced with cleft Montauk Black slate. (I couldn't decide between cleft or honed, and went with cleft - in hindsight, I think I would have preferred honed.) It's too late now, the money is spent that the tiles are sealed! Painstakingly, one at a time so the grout won't stick to the top surface.

My faithful helper. The tiles are glossy because they were still wet with sealer here.

Once they dried, I laid them out to stagger them so there wouldn't be a repeating pattern. Slate is a natural stone, so no two pieces are the same, but some are very similar. I also didn't want it blotchy with all the dark ones in one section and all the light ones in another.

This past weekend, I found myself with a few hours so I took a tile that featured both light and dark area and went to Lowe's to look at wall and accent tiles. They should really have a bench so you can lay stuff out next to each other in that area.

1. Slate with a lightly textured white subway tile with black/grey encaustic looking tile.

2. Slate with the same lightly textured white subway tile and a more heavily textured mosaic.

3. Slate/white crackled subway tile with an aged blue mosaic.

4. Same, but with the mosaic in greys.

5. Slate/beveled subway tile with a marble chip mosaic.

 

I think my order of choice is 2, 4 and 5. #2 gives a little interest without being married to a color. #4 gives more interest without an added texture, and nods ever so slightly to the historical. #5 is just super traditional and timeless. You can't tell in this photo, but you could warm or cool the room with whatever color accessories you added.
#3 is right out because there's deep unfilled tiny pockets in that tile that would be a bear to clean. I like #1, but I think the pattern is too big for the space.

I might mosey up to Home Depot later and do the same exercise with their stock.

I've been working on the door to convert it to a pocket door. This involved removing the 6+ coats of paint, sanding, conditioning, filling and priming it.

The door is on it's side way in the back of this image. The side facing the bathroom was painted to match the same green as the walls. The side facing into the dining room was painted white to match the trim in there.

Stripping stripping stripping. A curious detail began to emerge.

This weird detail. The door was painted, originally, to have this shadow on it. The inside was brown, the outside was white.

And here you see the whole door stripped down with the weird detail on the bottom and right side, but not really along the top (it tapered up and off the edge) and nothing on the left. This was clearly done on purpose, but why? What was it meant to look like, or be? Furniture? Curtains?

I'm not the first person to reuse this door. In the previous picture the edge closest to the camera had a strip added to the bottom to make it taller. Here we see a dutchman someone added to move the hinges. This also means the door used to swing the other way.

Thank goodness the bathroom side of the door was originally shellac'd. It made stripping this side so much easier. Also got a contoured scraper with changeable blades - that helped.

On to the sanding!

Dining room side sanded.

This door has seen some sh*t. Even with all the stripping and sanding, this area at the bottom of the bathroom side was so beat up, I finally left it alone. It seems someone enjoyed kicking this door open or closed, often.

Lots of scars. This is *not* the side with the wired paint shadows.

In order to make this a pocket door, it needs different hardware. This old mortise lock pocket needs to be filled.

Lots of sanding and shaping later, it fit.

Then the pulls needed to be bored out. I made it fall over where the old hardware was so that it would stay consistent with the height of the other doors in the dining room.

The bathroom hardware is all going to be brushed nickle, so the other side of the door got different hardware. Since you will never see both sides of the door at the same time, I was cool with it not matching each other, but rather matching it's own room.

The old lock hole blew out and needed to be filled.

There's a lot going on here. Clamps to hold in the mortise pocket block, clams to hold the tiny lock filler piece in, lots of fiddly bits of wood and LOTS of wood glue and filler...

But in the end, it sanded up nicely.

Sanded.

Hit it with a 50/50 mix of boiled linseed oil and turpentine - this is a trick I learned from the window restoration people. It helps condition the really old dried out wood to receive paint better.

So beat up. I wonder if this side faced an exterior at one point or another.

Oh but wait. This is going to be a pocket door. Which means that the exact size door that swung into a casement is going to just barely give you coverage as a slider. So I needed to tack a strip on the back end for privacy and stability. It will be in the wall, so it won't be seen - so where's that furring strip I had laying around from my window project?

Strip added. It "matches"the old strip added at the bottom. Not a bad job for a furring strip that was about as straight as cooked spaghetti. A lot of GRKs, hand planing, filling, and sanding happened here.

And the first coat of Kilz oil-based primer is on! So close!

 Might need another coat of primer and a light sand before final paint (B.M. "Super White" Gloss). Hopefully this week will see the end of the door project!

(Sorry Mom)

I've been monkeying around with the design and layout and lost the old format for the blog. Let me know if you can't find anything. I'll be working on it for a little while. All the content should still be here!