Looks like 'Santa's beard" and that's Ok, but I would avoid paper towels in the future. They are treated to not break down and newsprint (no glossy or colored ink), or plain old brown cardboard does much better.
I would also slack off some on the veggie scraps, they can end up adding too much moisture to the bin and causing problems. I add them just every now and then. Coffee grounds are good and I add a banana peel or 2 to the can I collect the grounds in, it kicks the breakdown up a notch. Chicken laying crumbles sprinkled on the surface works a treat. The worms flat out love it and it's usually totally consumed within 2 days.
HTH
Wet
patecatl
Member
Thank you I appreciate the suggestion. Didn’t know that about paper towels. What exactly is Santa’s beard?
You could google it for 'exact', but it is a fungal growth that shows up usually in freshly made mixes when there is a lot of stuff just starting to break down.
In worm bins it's a sign of a bit too much wet food added at once. I try to avoid it, but it does happen. It will sit for a bit (and make you worry you killed the worms), then break down to the worms liking and it's gone in short order.
I've been doing worms for over 8 years now and it still freaks me out sometimes how they so totally hide and avoid it till it decomposes to their liking. Then they totally swarm it like stoners being offered free pizza and beer. LOL
Getting a system that works for you is mostly trial and error and as long as you don't kill the worms you'll see what they do and don't like. As long as they don't try and escape the bin en mass (some do go s'ploring), the conditions are Ok for them, but if they are all trying to get away, something is bad wrong with the environment in the bin.
Wet