Print This List    Email to a Friend  

How to Make Your Own Worm Compost System  
HOW TO 

Tags: Compost, Worm Compost, Better Gardening

Vermiculture, or worm composting, allows you to compost all your food waste faster than you ever imagined, while producing the highest quality compost and fertilizing liquid. Best of all, it's self-contained and nearly odorless!

1.	Build (or buy) your worm bin. These can be purchased from many online vendors (Google "worm composting" - you'll be amazed!), or you can build your own. You can use rubber storage totes, galvanized tubs, wood or plastic. Rubber is cheap, easy to use and durable. Galvanized tubs are somewhat costy but will last forever. Wood will eventually be eaten and plastic cracks easily but either will do in a pinch. Your bin should be well-ventilated, with several 1/8 inch holes at the bottom (otherwise the worms will stay at the bottom of the bin and you may drown your worms). The larger you make the container, the more worms it can sustain. Estimate 1 pound of worms (1,200) for every square foot of surface area. The maximum depth for your bin is 24 inches deep because composting worms will not go further down than 24 inches. The bin should have a cover to prevent light from getting in and to prevent the compost from drying out but can be removed if your compost is too wet. For example, you can b
2.	Or you can use 4 old car tires: A four-tire wormery: Create a base from old bricks or flagstones (must be flat and with as few cracks as possible). Place a layer of heavy newspaper on top of the bricks. Stuff four old tires with newspapers. Pile the tires on top of each other, with the first tire on the sunday newspaper. Put some scrunched up paper or cardboard in the bottom to soak up any excess liquid. Fill the tire wormery with organic material (semi-composted is best). Add the composting worms (tiger or brandling species are best). Use a piece of board weighed down with bricks as a lid. The lid must be big enough to stop rain getting in. Harvest a tire's worth of fertilizer roughly every 8 weeks (during warm months).
3.	Prepare the box for worms. Fill your bin with thin strips of unbleached corrugated cardboard or shredded newspaper, straw, dry grass, or some similar material. This provides a source of fiber to the worms and keeps the bin well-ventilated. Sprinkle a handful of dirt on top, and thoroughly moisten. Allow the water to soak in for at least a day before adding worms. You can also use Canadian peat moss which is more expensive but yeilds a loamier vermicompost.
4.	Get worms. Again, the Internet is your best bet for finding a worm vendor near you. The worms most often used, Eisenia Foetida (or the red wiggler), are not native to the Americas and will not be found in your soil. There are other varieties of worms that will work but are much harder to find, just digging up earthworms from your backyard is not recommended. These worms are about 4 inches long, mainly red along the body with a yellow tail. Another variety to consider are Eisenia Hortensis, known as "European Nightcrawlers." They do not reproduce quite as fast as the red wigglers, but grow to be larger, eat courser paper and cardboard better, and seem to be heartier. They are also better fishing worms when they do reach full size. However, with any non-native species, it is important not to allow them to reach the wild. Their voracious appetites and reproductive rates (especially among the red wigglers) have been known to upset the delicate balance of the hardwood forests by consuming t
5.	Maintain your bin. Keeping your bin elevated off the ground, using bricks, cinderblocks, or whatever is convenient will help speed composting and keep your worms happy. Worms are capable of escaping almost anything. Shiplap redwood is the only container they are unapble to escape, however if you keep your worms fed and the right amount water, they should not escape. A light in the same area will ensure your worms stay put. Sprinkle the surface with water every other day. Feed your worms vegetable scraps at least once a week. Feeding lightly and often will produce more worms (which is good when starting a new bin) and large ammounts fed less often will fatten your worms (good for fishng). Add more cardboard, shredded newspaper, hay, or other fibrous material once a month, or as needed. Your worms will reduce everything in your bin quickly. You will start with a full bin of compost or paper/cardboard, and soon it will be half full. This is the time to add fibrous material.
6.	Harvest the compost, using one of the two following techniques. For the first technique, put on rubber gloves, and move any large uncomposted vegetable matter to one side. Then, with your gloved hands, gently scoop a section of worms and compost mixture onto a brightly lit piece of newspaper or plastic wrap. Scrape off the compost in layers. Wait a while giving the worms time to burrow into the center of the mound. Eventually you will end up with a pile of compost next to a pile of worms. Return the worms to the bin, do whatever you want with the compost, and repeat. If you prefer a hands-off technique, simply push the contents of the bin all to one side and add fresh food, water, dirt, and bedding to the empty space. The worms will slowly migrate over on their own which requres more patience than the prior technique. The last technique is to use a separator. Barrel separators are expensive and available on the internet. Shaker boxes are easy to make and use. To make a shaker box, use

Lister: ListAfterList Wiki Contributors
Source: WikiHow – All text in this list shared under a Creative Commons License

Other lists of interest:

How to Build a Compost Bin HOW TO  (1)

How to Compost Successfully & Safely HOW TO  (0)

How to Make a Compost Tea HOW TO  (0)

Pros and Cons of Using Compost and What To Do INFORMATIVE  (1)

How to Build a Tumbling Composter HOW TO  (1)

This list not rated yet – be the first to rate it 

There are no comments for this list. Be the first to post!