Worm composting bins
Worm composting bins are a great way to compost. It’s easy, inexpensive, reduces garbage and returns plant-friendly worm castings and compost tea. To properly care for your worms, they require the proper habitat, food, and a space to live and feed. The space to live and feed can be anything from an inexpensive bucket to a fantastic worm composting bin designed to minimize the work on your part and make life easier for your worms. These units will cost up to $150, but the right composting bin can pay for itself with the worm castings it helps generate.
Worm composting habitat
Composting with worm bins is easy and doesn’t require much. Here is what you need to keep them happy and composting year round.
Keep a layer of damp, shredded newspaper, cardboard, or leaves in each bin. Be sure the material is not too wet, or it’ll become matted together. Worms need to breathe, and the more air the faster the composting can occur. So, be sure there are gaps and spaces for air to circulate. Shredded cardboard or a couple larger sized pieces of vegetable waste (melon rinds, for example) should provide the airspaces needed for proper circulation within the worm composting bins. Plan on keeping an inch or two of shredded newspaper (dampened) on top of the current food bin to keep out fruit flies and reduce smells.
Worms have been around much longer than mankind. They can be kept indoors or be done outdoors. Worms prefer weather between 55 and 75 degrees, so keep that in mind. I just keep my bins in my basement, which is a constant 68 degrees, and they thrive in their composting bins in this environment.
Worm bins should be kept slightly damp, not wet. Don’t drown the worms in the bins! They can move around as needed to escape if some areas are too wet. The moisture in the bins work downward and many worm bins come with a spigot to drain excessive moisture out. This liquid consists of algae, fungus, bacteria, food particles, worm castings, and bedding material and is known as worm compost tea. Plants love this; it’s a 100% natural fertilizer. The results are amazing when used on indoor or outdoor vegetable plants. This is just another useful by-product of composting with worm bins!
Feeding worms in indoor worm bins
Worms are easy to take care of. They return your garbage (food scraps, newspapers, cardboard, dryer lint, egg shells, etc) as worm castings, a highly prized soil enhancement. So, what best to feed your indoor worms in the bins to get them to continually produce this organic rich soil?
Feed your worms vegetable and fruit table scraps. Melon rinds, apple peelings and cores, cucumber and potato peelings, egg shells, left over greens, carrots, etc. They will eat cardboard, dampened newspapers, dryer lint, plant waste, etc. Give them some leaves in the fall with some grass clippings in the summer and they will thrive. You will get rich, organic soil and your plants will thank you. So will the environment since you are reducing garbage and taking up less landfill space!
Things to avoid in an indoor worm composting bin include fatty foods, oils, meat products, dairy, plastics or glass, etc. Don’t expect worms to turn your entire garbage into useful soil….won’t happen. Also, avoid giving worms spicy foods like garlic or cinnamon as these can have powerful odors and cause your indoor worm composting bin to emit unpleasant smells. If you stick with the proper foods, you really shouldn’t smell anything…or just the faint earthy smell you might get from whiffing a plotted plant.