Worm Composting Wednesday

It has officially been one week since my worms arrived and I think I'm doing pretty good at my journey into worm composting. When I say I am doing pretty good I am going on the basis of my worms are not all dead.

I have decided to feed them once a week. During the week I keep a Ziploc container on the counter to collect food scraps that I think they may like- this week was strawberry tops, cantelope, peaches and steamed sweet potatoes. I think the fact that I kept fiddling with the bin adding food all week aggravated the worms so I am going to have a hands off policy.

Here is what my bin looks like today. The contents have settled from what was in there last week because of the moisture. I added some shredded egg cartons today that I moistened with water to give my little friends some different texture in their bedding.

In the past week I have found maybe five to ten escapees which were still alive and maybe fifteen escapees that weren't so lucky. All in all, out of about one thousand worms in the bin that is not so bad. I have been keeping the cover off (even with the cover on they can escape because it is not an airtight lid) because worms don't like light so they tend to not wander as much. Once I feel like the conditions in the bin are near perfect I will put the cover back on. I also may put a lot of dry shredded newspaper on top of the moist bedding to discourage any potential worms explorers based on the advice here. Worms like a moist environment but too much water will kill them- like how when it rains you see a ton of worms come out of the earth and then when the sun comes out there are a ton of dried up worms on the pavement.

For those of you wondering about the smell factor there really isn't one. I keep the bin in the laundry room which is where the dogs stay for part of the day (the kid's nap times- nothing sucks more than a dog barking during nap time) and is where I throw dirty diapers (wrapped in plastic bags but still a bit smelly). I guess what I am saying is that the smell is minimal and no worse than any other smells I have to deal with on a daily basis.

From what I read it could be about 2 1/2 months until I have some grade A worm compost and at that point I can use it on the blueberry plants I ordered.

Week one was a success!

For information from an expert on these matter go to Red Worm Composting.