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First, I would like to say that I hope you are keeping safe out there during these crazy times. My condolences go to all those who have lost someone due to the COVID-19 virus. Please keep safe and help protect others.
Do you want to start Worm Composting, but don’t know where to start?
Want to start without spending too much money?
It is very possible and super easy to do!
What is Worm Composting?
Worm Composting is a process of using various types of worms to convert waste material, such as food scraps, into organic material that can be used in the garden and in potted plants.
Worm Composting is super easy to do and can be fun for yourself and kids.
It is great for the environment because it reduces waste that goes into the landfills.
My History with Worm Composting
I have been working with Worm Composting for approximately six years now. But, it wasn’t until a couple years ago that I really started to pay more attention to my worm bins and they started to do really good.
My in-laws gave me my first worm tower that they picked up at a garage sale. I always fed them, but never got any good worm castings out of it.
I think the problem I had was that I was letting it get way too wet and never gave them enough bedding to move on to the next bin.
I fed them, and fed them, and fed them, but never added to and changed their bedding!
The worms actually lasted for a very long time under those terrible conditions until I started neglecting them for too long and they all died.
I started over with new worms that I ordered online.
One day I decided to put the worm bin in the shade on the back patio. They too died.
It was way too hot out there for them in the middle of summer, even though they were in the shade for most of the day.
I think the morning sun is what actually did them in even though it was cooler in the morning. The worm tower is black, which absorbs the suns heat when it hits the black plastic. It probably cooked them. Poor guys.
My wife bought me a new batch of worms from a local guy and she noticed that he had some plastic totes in his house with no drains. He was using those as his worm bins.
One thing that she noticed is that they did not smell at all.
We decided to give that method a try. This time I made sure they had a lot more bedding to help insulate them from the heat in the garage.
I used coconut coir for the bedding to get things started and made sure to add dry shredded cardboard to help keep things a little drier when it needed it.
They have been doing great in that bin, and eating a lot!
Since they have been doing so well, I have been giving the worm tower another try. They too seem to be doing great and the number of worms are growing.
The difference between now and before is that I am spending a little more time with them and paying more attention to the amount of bedding they have and what I am feeding them.
I make sure the bins do not become too wet or too hot.
During winter, I kept an eye on them to make sure they do okay in the colder temperatures in the garage. I made sure they had enough bedding in the bins to help insulate them. The temperatures in the garage made it down to the 30’s Fahrenheit and they did just fine.
Things You Will Need
Although this list might seem long, there really isn’t much to it and not everything listed here is needed. It kind of depends on the setup you go with.
- A container of some kind to create a home for the worms
- You can use a plastic tote to keep things cheap ($5-10). Mine are 18 gallon. Anything larger might get too heavy to move. Keep it opaque, not clear. These are nice because they are longer than a bucket and you can put food to one half of the bin to encourage the worms to move to that side when you want to collect up the old castings without having to pick out the worms yourself.
- I have seen people use 5 gallon buckets, but you will have to have multiples if you want to allow the worms to move away from the used castings. This would put the cost slightly higher than a single plastic tote.
- Find a Worm Tower or other worm composting setup from a garage sale. Anything you purchase new can be pricey so I will not be showing how to set them up in this article since this is supposed to be about “cheap”.
- Some bedding material. Here are some options:
- Shredded newspaper (Could be free)
- Cardboard (Free from all the online ordering you probably do)
- Coconut Coir ($20). This is one of the products I use (paid link). The listing says that it expands to 2.2 cubic feet (approximately 15 gallons). Depending on the size of bin you are creating and if you want left overs, you could buy a smaller block to make it cheaper. I would look for one that specifically says that it can be used for worm bedding. This whole block lasts for a long time since I cut it into quarters and use only one quarter per bin.
- Peat Moss ($20). Price is for the same cubic feet as the Coconut Coir listed above. I have not tried peat moss in my bins, but other people have and it seems to work just fine for them. You could also buy a smaller amount to reduce the cost.
- Garden Soil (Just a few bucks). This is optional. I have never added garden soil to my bins. But it can be cheaper than Coconut Coir or Peat Moss.
- Dirt (Free!). I keep a small can of dirt so I can sprinkle a little in the bin a few times a month. This adds grit for the worms, which helps with their digestion process.
- Worms!
- Red wigglers seem to be the most common for worm composting. You can find them online or from a local supplier, if one exists near you. These here are the worms I have used (paid link).
- There are other types of worms used for worm composting, but I have not tried them myself.
- Food for the worms
- You can get an idea of what to and not to feed the worms here.
- Tools
- 5 gallon bucket or other container approximately this size to hydrate the Coconut Coir, if you are using the Coconut Coir. This bucket will also be used to soak the newspaper and/or cardboard in water.
- Rubber spatula (Optional). This is helpful with cleaning off the hand fork and cleaning up the bins.
- 3 Tine Garden Hand Fork (Optional). This is used for digging around in the worm bin to bury the food. I say “optional” because you can really use anything you might already have on hand, like a large spoon or garden trowel. You can even use your hands, but I recommend wearing rubber gloves if you do because it can get a bit messy.
- Something to separate the Castings (Optional) and large unfinished food scraps and newspaper and/or cardboard bedding from the worm castings. You can make a simple worm casting harvester as I have shown here. Or, if you want something a little more extravagant, you can make a Worm Casting Harvester trommel that I made here.
The Set Up
The set up I am going to show you here is probably one of the least expensive methods you will find if you are buying everything new, other than putting your worms directly in the ground, which is always an option.
Grab an 18 gallon plastic tote and separate the lid from the container.
I drilled a bunch of small holes in the lid of my bins. When I say a bunch, I mean a lot, a lot. My lids could probably still use more holes than what I have provided! There is a possibility that this may not be providing enough air circulation, but overall, I have not had too many problems with this method, probably because I tend to check on the bins a lot. You could always cut a large hole in the lid and attach some window screen over the hole.
Your bin is now ready and you will need to get the bedding ready.
I like to use Coconut Coir. But to keep things cheaper, you can shred up some newspaper and/or cardboard.
Newspaper is easy to shred by hand, even when dry. But if you have a paper shredder, this will make things much easier and create much nicer bedding.
To shred cardboard easily, fill up the 5 gallon bucket, or other large container, with the large cardboard pieces. You can easily roll up the cardboard to make it fit.
Make sure everything is covered in water and let it soak for a few hours or over night so that it gets very soft. Ripping apart dry cardboard gets real tough after a while and can kill your hands. Soaking it in water softens it up a lot and I think that it won’t bother most people.
After soaking the bedding, grab a handful and squeeze out the water back into the bucket and put the wet bedding into the tote. You will want to fill up about one quarter of the tote with the bedding.
Make it somewhat fluffy so that doesn’t compact too soon.
Now add your worms.
Let your worms acclimate to their new home for a day or two and then give them some food.
A Few Tips
I mentioned that I like to use Coconut Coir.
Using newspaper by itself has some drawbacks just like any other method has. But the main issue with using only newspaper is that it compacts easily. It also does not have the high moisture capacity as other materials, like cardboard or Coconut Coir.
Coconut Coir is a great bedding material because it is fluffy and does not compact much. It also holds moisture very well.
It is important to provide ventilation because plastic totes don’t breath very well. This will help prevent the bedding from going sour. You do not want that to happen.
You could provide drainage holes in the bottom of the tote, but be sure to have something that catches the drainage.
I keep a lot of cardboard on hand to add to the bins, especially when things begin to get wetter than they should.
When the beds begin to get too wet, I add some dry cardboard to the bottom of the bins to help absorb the moisture. If the cardboard was wet, it would not soak up the moisture.
Sometimes keeping the lid off the bin for a little while helps dry things out a bit.
You can read more on what I do with the cardboard here.
You only want the bedding damp, not wet.
Most importantly, keep an eye out on how your bin and worms are doing. If you don’t check on them every couple days, things can start to go wrong fairly quickly, especially after a big feeding.
Learn how the worms react to different foods.
Learn how different foods change the environment inside the bin. Some foods add a lot more moisture to the bin than other foods do.