EP 6: What Is Vermiculture and How Does It Help The Planet? with Cathy Nesbitt

Welcome to Ready Set glow, a podcast where I interview the person behind the brand. We're gonna talk about what it took to get started the lessons learned along the way, and the advice they have for you on your own journey. I'm your host, Mary Harcourt, founder and CEO of Cosmo glo. In today's episode, we're gonna talk to a Toronto based worm farmer. Yes, you heard that right. Kathy is a worm farmer and a worm advocate who insists worms are the original Alchemist. Worms convert food and paper waste into super nutrient rich soil known as Black Gold. With a background in waste management, she knows a thing or two about it. As a population, people produce an incredible amount of waste, and very little of it ever goes on to be produced into something beneficial. With a worm bin, you can cut down on your own personal waste contributions, as well as add beneficial soil back into the earth. You can have a setup in any size space, even in a busy city studio apartment. It's a wonderful project for kids to be involved with, and a much cheaper pet alternative to have even a dog or a cat. Worms are sold by the pound the half pound and the soil enriched contains natural antidepressants. So working with your bare hands is highly recommended to get those added benefits. In addition to the typical worm, Kathy also farms sprouts, which are healthy, nutrient rich plants that can be in raw, used in sandwiches or as a snack, a woman who describes her life as a magic carpet ride. She also wants us to learn about laughter yoga, and how beneficial it truly can be for the mind, body and soul. The old saying laughter is the best medicine doesn't get nearly enough attention considering how powerful it truly can be. Kathy, welcome to the show. Um, what are the benefits of worms and why should we all have them? Yeah, beautiful. So this is i It's indoor composting that I'm proposing. So it's the same idea as outdoor composting. The worms require a carbon nitrogen mix and the carbon is the the bedding the shredded paper. So it could be leave straw, cardboard, and the nitrogen is the food scraps. So all your clippings from the kitchen coffee, tea, you know your fruit and bed. Yeah, and the worms eat all of that and turn it into this nutrient rich, beautiful fertilizer. So if I'm feeding them my coffee grounds, are they wired and staying up all night? Yeah, it's a beautiful thing and coffee grounds. Thanks for mentioning coffee grounds because there's a lot of coffee drinkers, right? And we're producing a lot of grounds. So the worms, the coffee grounds are a perfect nitrogen source. The worms don't have teeth. So the coffee grounds you don't need to chop them. They don't attract fruit flies. coffee grounds are a beautiful thing. Interesting. So to have a worm bin, you get some worms, you toss them in, and then you just do paper scraps, food scraps, and they become their own little ecosystem. Exactly, yes. So there's a whole host of microorganisms that are at work in a worm bin, or in a composter. So all of those materials will break down the fruit and vegetable peels that paper the worms kind of eat their poop. So it's, it is a whole ecosystem. Yes. It's beautiful. Interesting. And you so worms by the half gallon, gallon, how quickly do they reproduce? If I buy a gallon worms? Is it like me and my crew of worms forever? Or will eventually turn into two gallons? three gallons and then what do I do with them?

Okay, by the pound or half pound? I don't know if it makes a difference. But there you go. So, yeah, the worms that have a phenomenal reproduction rate. People talk about rabbits. They have nothing on worms. Wow. Well, we'll just say that they they will double the number under ideal conditions in about three to five months. They are living organisms. So temperature, moisture and air floor are the key ingredients temperature, room temperature, if we're comfortable, they're comfortable or 60 to 80 Fahrenheit roughly moisture about 75% humidity and airflow so you wouldn't need to have holes in your in your bed. They eat all the material, turn it into nutrient rich soil, and then they're also increasing in number.

So I start with a word Ben and I become a worm farmer after three to five months because they've doubled their capacity.

Yeah, exactly. And you become a worm farmer the minute that you take on the worms,

are they gross? Like are they slimy? What kind of worms do you farm? I'm split between being like fascinated by this. And this is also the things nightmares are made of.

Thank you for addressing that. That is perfect Mary because I was afraid of worms before starting. They're not gross. They're not achy. When we change our mind, right. It's all about mindset. We hear that word a lot today. It totally is. The worms are not grocery achy, they have five Hearts eat it's hard month and Valentine's Days around the quarter. So beautiful. Isn't that like a lot of love? And I do a lot of school workshops and I say to the kids, they asked me, why did they have five hearts? And I say, so we can love them a little bit more.

But what things do have five hearts? I've never heard of any living creature having five hearts.

I think octopuses or octopi have, I think,

do you find there's a whole worm subculture? Like is there Facebook groups meetups? Or is it really just as simple as it sounds? And you have a worm farm at your house? And they're decomposing your waste?

So it's the 20th anniversary of migrate green business.

Wow. Congratulations. Yeah.

Thank you. Yeah, thank you. I'm really excited to be here because 20 years selling worms by the pound. Wow, I have seminar right? To answer your question. There are like all of these things. There are meetup groups, there are Facebook groups for permaculture for gardening, right, which any gardener knows, if you want to grow something beautiful. And like with big blooms and, and tasty fruits and vegetables, you need to start with a soil, the soil, not the plant, right? There are all kinds of chemical fertilizers out there that say Oh, put this on and you'll have big fruits and vegetables, but it does nothing for the soil.

We happen to live on a ranch and the lady before us was a I'm gonna mess this up by even saying it some kind of biologist and would study the soil and make sure that we had the right amount of nitrates and all of this thing in the soil and everything in that garden grows. It's unbelievable. We're like the mecca of it because of the soil. It's so healthy.

Right? That's right. I started my business as a waste management tool. I'm located just north of Toronto and our landfill closed in oh two. And we started exporting garbage to the US 1000 trucks a week. Merry 1000 trips a week. Yeah, Hicks. This is indoor composting with worms. I wanted everybody to have a worm bin, every family, every school, every business everywhere, worms everywhere. So then when we're having a you know, our apple, we're like, oh, where's the worm bin, I'll just put that in like we do with recycling or, you know, any of these programs. So I was like, Oh, here we go launch my business. Won't this be great, then I realize short on that. Yes. In addition to waste, waste management or waste minimization, the worms convert this material into nutrient rich soil so that we can grow more delicious, nutritious fruits and vegetables naturally. Now I've realized the waste management part is the side benefit. Really, the beautiful part is the soil because then we're growing more nutrient rich food. When we're healthy, we can do good work, right? If we're not feeling well, we're sick and whatever. We can't We can't think about the planet. You can't be environmentally conscious. If you're not, you know, feeling well and you're not fully functioning, you're just worried, you know, you're just kind of struggling along.

So how does one find them as a worm worm was a lifelong dream was a little bit accidental discovery based on your background in waste management? How did this just come to become?

Yeah, actually, no, I was not a lifelong dream. And I was afraid of worms that worms were gross. And I bought my house. I moved out of Toronto in 93. And I couldn't wait to start gardening and composting. And a teacher friend asked me to look after her worm bin. I've never heard of it. But as an avid gardener, I knew the value of the compost. You know, I think that that we should try things rather than letting people say, Oh, you won't like that. You know, so I took on a challenge. It was horrible. I had fruit flies. AndI was like, I'm never doing this again. I kept the worms alive. And all was well except, you know, it was gross. So I said, I'm never gonna do that again. And then I was getting my psych degree. When did I graduate? 2000 I graduated got a job at a group home working with challenged adults. They had 10 homes in a farm, and they didn't compost. And I was like, wow. So they were paying all this money. I mean, if you produce any volume of food scraps, it rots pretty fast. Right? You got to get rid of it. You live on a ranch? That's fine. You have a space. Not right grocery stores don't you know, universities, hospitals, all of the restaurants I mean, you know, BC Oh, four COVID.

Restuarant themselves create so much food waste as we do in our own personal houses. Well, every time I cook dinner, it's a it's an effort to get cleaned up and kind of get the kitchen back to normal.

Exactly right. Anyway, was the first time that I really saw people don't connect what they do. They're creating all of this food waste, and then paying over here to get rid of it. I said, Hey, why don't you do composting and the greenhouse manager said, What about worm composting? And I was like ah, But then I, when I came home that day from work, I was like, they're not getting worms tomorrow. It's an institution. So I started to do research. And then right it was my second introduction. And I was like, Oh my gosh, I had I realized these worms, they're red wiggler worms, special worms. They convert, you know, food scraps and paper into into fertilizer, have five hearts each turn, you know, all of these things. And I was like, Oh my gosh, my fear of them. Or my, my thought of in them being gross, converted into love and all and I was like, wow. And then I tried to get worms, and I couldn't buy worms. Oh, Canada year round. So I was like, interesting. Everything. I feel like this was put in my path.

Yeah, it was your path to find your calling and to be in that niche. And now people have a way to find worms, they can look you up on your website, order a half pound, they can do it themselves in their kitchen. And even if it's in a SkyRise building in a busy city, you can have this little bit of a green imprint on your life. Or if you have kids, what a wonderful experience to show them how things break down. And like you said, eating the apple and thrown it in. I feel like kids are always looking for something scientific. And they want to see what happens if, and it will be great to take their food scraps from the end of lunch and throw them in and come back. How long does it take them to decompress? If we take up a couple things of fruits, vegetables and throw them in? Is it we come back in five days? And it's gone? It's gone in three weeks? How long does it take to kind of decompress Iraq or something rather than eating everything?

Yeah, that's a great question. It really depends on a lot of factors. This is going to sound like I'm going to sound like a politician answering this one. You know, it really depends on particle size, temperature, moisture, and things break down faster than others. Like, oh, I'll take like cabbage has a life of its own. It lasts forever. And like potato peels, right? If it has the eye on it, that's the future growth. So in that nutrient rich environment, that potato peel may start to grow. And the worm bin is a beautiful demonstration of that. And if it is growing, the worms don't have teeth, so they can't eat that they cannot they don't have eyes, but if they did, and they don't talk, but if they did, that would be like oh, look at that beautiful potato plant that we can't eat.

Don't let it go. Yeah, absolutely. So that brings me to my next thing because you also do sprout farming. Are they two totally different things? Or do you do those on top of each other? Is there worms on the bottom of sprouts on top?

Yeah, that's great. Thank you. That's what you would think. But they're totally separate. I actually brought my mouse to grow to show you so it does have a little mesh in it. It's hard to see because it's transparent. It's it's clear. There's pictures of it on my website so people can see but I wanted to show you the sprouts that they grow Look at this beautiful food.

Oh wow. Amazing. See but doesn't salad What do you eat a Raleigh? What do you do with them?

This is my health plan. So this is two cups. This is a two cup container. Three tablespoons of those of the same values. Yeah, so you know the the the white beans, the beans sprouts in Chinese food? Yes. Okay, those are mung beans. Okay, those are the, those are the seeds that I use, but they're just grown a different way. You just as soon as the seed of the Venus germinated, that's when they're most nutritious. So these are super fast, they will germinate in 24 to 48 hours. Heat and humidity is what makes it work. It's like a little greenhouse, right, a little hydroponic greenhouse water in the bottom. So it's not soil at all, They are two totally separate, almost unfortunate because it would be cool to have all these things down maybe amazing soil,

you think that you could just throw this brown sit on top, but they're two totally different things. But that's also another thing that you can do at home by yourself or with a family or with your kids is grow sprouts that are very nutritious and can add into multiple different plates that you're cooking. So that's great. You have this whole thing about four drugs you need and the medical effects that you can get from soil.

Yes, so the so there's antidepressant microbes in your soil. And here's the the thing for today, you know, we're on our technology a lot. I don't even have a cell phone.Keep breathing people. I function just fine.But we're on our phones a lot. We're on our technology a lot. And when we're gardening, we can't be on our technology because it would get dirty. I really don't believe that we were meant to multitask the way that we do. Right? We think we're so productive, but we're really not because we're just spinning and spinning and running here and there. I mean, even now you know how many people are late arriving in the Zoom Room. It's like, you didn't even have to go anywhere. You just have to walk into the other room.

Interesting. There's a whole movement of grounding which is going outside with your very feet or hands and sitting in the grass, because there's some kind of I don't even know how to explain it. I'm not the expert in this but like some kind of chemical change that happens with reconnecting with the Earth, which I would think the same thing is happening with your hands in bare soil.

Absolutely. It's called earthing. Yes. And I've been earthing. i Oh, gosh. Oh, with my beautiful green business, you know, I'd have had so many opportunities exhibiting at these super cool kind of green expos. You know, it's 20 years. So for 20 years, I've been involved in these little niche markets, where you don't find these things in the big box stores are on line. Like when you're shopping online and stuff. You have to go to these cool little places. I bought the book, earthing back in 2010. I think it was, and just thought this makes so much sense. And just in short, when we started wearing shoes, we got disconnected from the earth.

Yes, absolutely.

That's when kind of when we started to create imbalance in our body because then we're not connected to the Earth's energy. And I don't know about it either. I really don't know more than that. Except I know how I feel like Earth every day except not in the winter.

A little chilly right now.

Yeah, it's pretty cold. But people should check that out that was that was kind of discovered or not not invented because it's Earth's energy but but discovered by a gentleman who was a cable installer. So he worked with electricity, and somehow stumbled upon it and made connections and now they have earthing products, you know that you can sleep on an earthing mat, you know, so it's people should check that out because we really are disconnected. And that would help solve a lot of our inflammation issues and just so many that's really a whole nother thing. And I would encourage you to have somebody on to talk about earthing

as well as dealing with the worms, you go in bare hands, and you're connecting with the soil in that way. Getting all those What did you call antidepressant microorganisms?

Yes. Oh, yeah. The anti depressant microbes. Can you imagine like gardeners are happy, and there's a reason

I believe it. Well, it's a whole nother topic, but I'm so intrigued. You're also into laughter yoga, which I've never heard about before, but I'm also very intrigued. I like yoga. And who doesn't like to laugh? So explain to me what is laughter yoga, the benefits of it, and we should probably all be doing that too.

Right. I know. I have such wonderful solutions for today's life to live a wonderful life. Laughter Yoga is not about fancy pants or poses. It's doing yoga and laughing. Okay. Right. Okay, so it was started in 1995 by a medical doctor, Dr. Madame materia, his goal is world peace through laughter. Wow. So the yoga part is the deep diaphragmatic breathing. Our diaphragm is connected to all of our organs. So when we're when we're saying the sounds Whoa, and Ha, we're like really like saying, Whoa, whoa, and haha.

So Santa wasn't that far off when he said, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Right. Exactly. hopeful. Yeah. So when we're, when we're saying those sounds, we're moving our diaphragm. And so it's like internal jogging. It really is a cardiovascular workout. And when we're laughing, we're secreting the love drugs, dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, and endorphin versus cortisol, with that we secrete when we're stressed. Like we literally are in charge of our own Pharma. When we're stressed, we're not breathing properly. So we're secreting cortisol. We're in fight flight or freeze, you know, we're frantic. When we're laughing, it raises our vibration, it brings us to the present. I mean, it has so many benefits, and it oxygenates our beautiful brain. So we can come up with solutions,

and be more creative. And with more creation, you can be more innovative and think about different things to all help the university we live in. So how does this work? Are there laughter sessions? Do you go to a class is

Yeah, it's really like laughter classes because it's about 10 to 15 minutes of sustained belly laughter It's not jokes or comedy, because those are conditional. Those are, you know, maybe somebody that the better the joke and then it's not funny for everybody, right? So this is just little games. There's clapping and chanting and when you're clapping you clap palm to palm. So you're activating the meridians. It's Whoa, whoa, ha ha has the mantra. It seems ridiculous. Yes.

You're getting results. You told me that you have rock hard abs. I mean, that's impressive. If I think it rock her abs from laughing I'm in

Right, exactly. It's super fun. It connects us. So you know it before before this cuckoo time we were of course meeting in person, it was really great like in person laughter clubs are the best zoom can't can't match the the magnificence of laughing in person. But it's a wonderful, it's a wonderful way that we've all pivoted online. And so it's like the Brady Bunch, right? You have gallery view, so you can see everybody, and there's little games. So everybody looking at each other. It's it's making eye contact, connecting, and then it's contagious in a good way.

Sure. LAUGHTER It's contagious. And they also say laughter is the best medicine, which is probably the basis of where that came from, and has been so overrated, that, you know, we all say that saying, and it goes and comes and goes, but maybe that is the root of it all is laughter is the best medicine because it does release all of these things, these dopamine that make you feel good and lower your stress, which I feel like as you said, we're not that great at multitasking. I think we multitask more and produce more stress without ever giving ourselves a moment to balance all of that.

Remember when the BlackBerry came out, and they called it the Crackberry?

Yeah, the original like a little roller ball fell out. You're devastated.

Right? When you know, it would be like, Oh, who's who's contacting me? It? Was it. Boohoo? Yeah. It that's how we are now except it's amped up so many more times, because there's so many more platforms now. We're online all the time wondering Oh, what am I missing out on? Oh, that over there that over there? Oh, how can we focus? We got to just like

decompress, take one thing at a time. Yeah, put our hands in soil grow some worms lower our carbon footprint by taking our food waste and paper. I mean, do they eat newspaper paper towels and how much? You said half a gallon of worms could eat a ton of trash in a year? You said a pound of worms found our kind of worms and their descendants? Yes. Okay.

Yeah, they have their weight per day and food scraps. So the so the gardening and the food scraps? It's it's significant. It really is significant what the worms can do. Yeah,

do they make noise.

You know, they they don't really know they're in an enclosed bin. And yeah, no, they don't they you can't hear them. Sometimes if you open up the bin, you might hear them kind of scoot away, because they're kind of at the top eating at the top. And when they don't like the light, so when you open the lid, they're gonna scoot down. Oh, but it would just be like, like, and this is a cheaper alternative than having a dog or a cat. Right? And you can go away for a few days.

That's true. So when it comes to you and your farming, do you have like your cruel that elzar Your worms and no one touches them? Or do they just they're all blending in the ones that you sell and get away versus the ones that are your pets that you keep or they all they are universal?

That's a great question. I do have a few kind of separate units that are those are my babies that you know, I'm just like my sourdough bread. Those are my babies.

How long do they live?

Well, if they live up to 10 years, so I think what I say to people by bringing worms inside, we're actually extending their life because there's a lot of predators in the wild for worms.

Well, I have 30 chickens. I've already thought about if I get worms and they reproduce. I mean, I could find a place for them to go. They might not enjoy their outcome, but my chickens would.

Chickens. There's really a pecking order.

Oh, there is yeah, they are some interesting creatures that is for sure.

They love worms marry, you should get a worm farm to manage your scraps. I know the chickens eat all the scraps you could just like and then and then you know people that feed their worms, their chickens worms. The chickens are healthier and you know it because the worms are pure protein.

Well, it's fascinating to I have houseplants as well and I look at them and they need to be repotted and the soils now just seems to be dry even when I water it but if I had the black gold, I would love to repop them introduce that new healthy soil like rich and nutrients to my little plants and watch how good they would do versus just what they have now or what you buy in the back from the grocery store who knows what's not what's in there?

Right? Yes, that industry is not regulated folks, and

interesting. And with how they produce food these days. There are so many chemicals that we are consuming without even knowing that having a hand and this is what you were talking about earlier in the episode is understanding that you are making that soil and that soil is going to nourish the planet that you put it on and then if you can grow food out of that it's full circle because you're going to cut it up and put the scraps right back into those worms so you create your own little ecosystem.

Yay thank you that's what I always say it's like the infinity loop right where you you eat the food you feed the scraps to the worms they eat it they make the soya grow more food. Yeah, thank you, Mary. Beautiful.

Okay, you are so interesting. I feel like we could talk to you forever between the laughter yoga between a sprouts farmer, your world farmer which I didn't know was a thing until today. Where can people let's say they're at home going I could do this or I'm intrigued and want to learn more or my kids would die if we could bring home like a worm farm and let them have fun and experiment with it. Where can they go is Kathy's composters.com the best website for you?

Yes, all of my offerings are there. That's my original website. Yes,

the Cathy's composters.com and then you can also find you on Facebook, which is tackies Crawley comm posters and these are happy with a sea of Cathy's probably pulled up composters on Facebook and Kathy's composters calm. These will also be on my website because I post all the episodes with a little bio of what we're talking about today. So that information will be readily available on my website, which is Mary Harcourt calm. And then under the episodes tab, you can always go there for more information about our guests. And Kathy, thank you so much. You have been such a joy. I feel like we could talk forever about worms and laughter and just the things you get from soil that nobody ever talks about and food waste. But I limited time on today. So thank you so much for being a part of today's show.

Thank you, Mary. I really appreciate the opportunity.

Absolutely. Well, I hope that we can lower our carbon footprint and get some worms out there, reproduce them and feed them to my little chickens who will be so happy. Hey, whoa. Awesome. Thank you so much enjoyed meeting you. That wraps up today's episode. For more information on our guests. You can find them at Mary harcourt.com under the episodes tab. You can always find me on Instagram at Mary Harcourt underscore and at the cosmic law light. I hope you enjoyed this episode and many more to come