4 ~ Wednesday, April 17, 1991 - North Shore News

Compostin

LIFE IS full of strange ironies, n’est-ce pas?

A while ago I decided to buy a
Vermicomposter —- a plastic box
with a drip tray underneath, seal-
ed with an air-vented lid, contain-
ing a couple of bushel-bags worth

of soil and about 200 or 300 earth-

worms.

These smal! hermaphroditic
‘Red Wigglers’’ van eat between
three and four pounds of leftovers
per week.

So long as you make sure to dig
holes and push a fistful of left-
overs down so that it is covered
by at least two inches of topsoil,
there is no problem with odors.

You have to give the worms
about cight ounces of water each
week. But other than that, they
are Self-maintaining.

Being more similar to humans
than most of us care to admit, the
worms tend to like the same foods
as we do. They aren’t too keen, !
discovered, on uncooked potato
peels, but they will go through the
remains of a bowl of fruit cocktail
or chocolate cake in no time at
all.

Pizza, spaghetti, pancakes,
beans, even coffee grounds and
tea bags are all perfectly fine with
the worms. It is helpful to give
them a tablespoon of ground-up
egg shells once a week, just to
keep their calcium levels up.

Other than that, they manage to
entertain themselves quite nicely.
Of course it’s easy for them.

After studying them for a while,
it dawned on me that they are
possibly the most efficient

Sob
Hunter

STRICTLY PERSONAL

creatures on (or in) earth, suc-
ceeding, as they do, in combining
eating, excreting and sex virtually
into one act, with the end result
being the creation of fabulous
topsoil.

You gotta love it.

Having a boxful of worms in
the kitchen is, incidentally, a ter-
rific way to get the kids interested
in composting, while giving them
a hint of a few major philosoph-
ical ideas.

The unit is essentially designed
for people in apartments or con-
dominiums who don’t havea
yard to do their composting in.

We have a yard, but J wanted
to get slightly fanatical about the
whole business. So in addition to

the 19-gallon Vermicomposter in
the kitchen, we have two other
composting units in the back yard.

The first one is a standard
plastic garbage pail rigged with a
ventilating pipe and an aerator at
the bottom, a cheap home-made
job that [ have been using for
over a year.

It’s already full of juicy black
compost aquiver with nutrients,
just about ready to be mixed into
the garden.

In addition, I picked up a $50
‘*Green Cone Food Waste
Digester,’’ a spacey-looking
recycled plastic bin that sits par-
tially buried in the lawn.

The 80 per cent of food waste
that is water gets absorbed into
the ground while natural microbes
enter from below and break down
the remaining solid material.

The great thing about the Green
Cone is that is takes meat, fish,
poultry and dairy products, all the
stuff I’m not supposed to throw
into the other composter, or to
the worms for that matter.

But this is all by way of in-
troducing a moment of strange
irony. Well, maybe not ‘‘strange’’
so much as poignant, ridiculous,
sad and just a trifle confused.

While purchasing my Ver-
micomposter, | had also done a
television show about the product.
The owner of the company in-
sisted on donating a small Ver-
micompostet to the TV station as
a demonstration unit. Fair
enough.

So I set up the plastic box with

Quinn steps down as IFC boss

PETER QUINN, president and
chief executive officer of North
Vancouver-based Versatile Pacific
Shipyards Inc. (VPSI), has step-
ped down as the head of In-
tegrated Ferry Constructors Ltd.
(EFC).

The North Vancouver company
was established to oversee con-
struction of a $120-million
superferry for the B.C. Ferry
Corp. (BCFC).

Quinn has been replaced as

NEW

4099 E Hastings

IFC’s chairman, president and
chief executive officer by Luciile
Johnstone, former president and
chief executive officer of the Riv-
tow Group of companies.

Quinn had said he does not
have the time to manage the af-
fairs of both VPSI and IFC.

Last month VPSI was granted
B.C. Supreme Court protection
from his creditors under the
Companies’ Creditors Protection
Act and has until July 15 to
restructure its finances or face

bankruptcy.

VPSI is one of severu: Lower
Mainland shipyards that has bid
on construction of the 479-vehicle

superferry, which will be con-
structed at VPSI’s Esquimalt
shipyard.

North Vancouver's Allied Ship-
builders Ltd. has already won a
$6-million subcontract for the
superferry. Apart from VPSI, a
third North Vancouver shipyard,
Vancouver Shipyards Co. Ltd.,
has tendered a bid on the vessel.

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maybe 100 worms by my desk,
and proceeded to explain to
squeamish types that the little
beasts wouldn't get out and at
the same time warned the sports
fishermen in the office that I
would hold them accountable if
my worms suddenly started disap-

pearing just before long weekends.

It so happened that the food
bank had been asking for dona-
tions to help the hungry at about
this time. | kept meaning to bring
some stuff to the collection box in
the office, but the day | finally
got around to it was 24 hours too
late. The collection box was gone.

The weekend came. I had to
leave my {00 worms alone for two
days. Nobody else in the office

e can be a rotten affair

had gotten used to feeding them.
The bag of groceries intended for
the poor was still under my desk.

Accordingly, | found myself
having to tear open a box of
macaroni to feed the worms, feel-
ing guilty about all those hungry
people, and thinking that, some-
how, this must be symbolic.

Of something. I mean, the im-
age: feeding worms while people
go hungry, yet composting being
such a good eco thing...Help!

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