Make a worm bin for all your kitchen waste. You can compost right in your apartment without any odor and no mess. If you have enough room for two shoeboxes, you have enough room to do vermiculture. This example uses a 12 quart plastic container.
Difficulty: Average
Time Required: One Hour
Here's How:
- With a drill or hammer and nail, make multiple holes along the lid and about 1 inch down from the top edge of the bin. Keep them small since the worms may crawl out and dry up if the holes are large enough.
- Tear fresh newspaper into 1 inch strips and separate just enough to be fluffy.
- Fill bin 3/4 full of newspaper. You would be able to press this amount down to at least 1 inch of compacted paper but leave it light and airy.
- Sprinkle water over all the newspaper until most of it is damp but NOT dripping. This is important because worms can not swim.
- Remove worms from as much of the bedding that they came in. This is just for sanitary reasons and helps cut down on anything arriving with your worms that you don't want. Place worms on the damp newspaper. You can spread them out or just in one spot. They will go where they want to.
- Place a small amount of food on the newspaper. I start each bin of 100 worms with a banana peel and a small amount of coffee grounds.
- Cover and place bin in complete darkness.
- Check bin every day for the first two weeks to evaluate dampness and how much kitchen scraps your worms can eat.
Tips:
- Red Wigglers,or Eisenia foetida, are the specific worm for vermiculture. They are sold with the crickets and meal worms as feed for many other exotic pets. These cost around $3.00 for 50 of them.
- If there is condensation on the inside of the bin or lid, wipe it away with a paper towel. Too much moisture can promote mold and drops of water will create a wet area on the bottom of the bin where worms can drown.
- Use your nose a a judge of how the bin is doing. There should never be a musty or spoiled smell.
- Your bin should not be dripping wet but should remain damp. Add a misting of water or sprinkle additional water onto the contents of the bin if it seems to be drying out. Be careful with sprinkling as it can easily be too much water.
- Add more worms if you desire. This bin system can hold twice the recommended number in this article.
What You Need:
- 12 quart plastic bin with lid
- Drill or hammer and a nail to poke holes in lid and sides
- 100 red wiggler worms-found online or inexpensively at your local pet store.
- Newspaper-torn in 1 inch wide strips and separated into a loose pile for bedding
- Water to moisten newspaper strips with.
- Kitchen scraps
