HELP i've just got a wormery

My first one I bought off ebay for about £20, when it arrived i found it was only 4 stackable plastic boxes with a lid on one and a tap screwed in the bottom one. Holes had been drilled in all but the bottom box.

So after seeing this I got down the pound shop and got five big plastic boxes and a plastic screw in tap. 30min and a bit of drilling later I had a new bigger wormery, and it's working a lot better than the more expensive one off ebay.

 

Just wanted to say Hi as a fellow wormer ....

Mould is good btw - worms really don't mind it at all

A wormery is a little ecosystem, with moulds , fungis and heaps of little creatures all helping to break it down

If anyone needs any help just shout me !!

Ronnie

 

Hi there Ronnie,

one more thing I'm rather confused about - they say not to overfeed the worms at the start, but how much exactly is too much? I'm currently giving them sort of a large cereal bowl's worth every 2-3 days, but I actually fill up a bowl a day (the rest is going in the green bin at mo). When I open the wormery I do see the odd worm slithering under the rubbish, but sometimes I have to give it all a little stir to see/wake them up. I started almost a month ago now if that helps.

 

Hi
That is the million dollar question.

Its very hard to get it right in the beginning, however I always say, its better to underfeed than over, the worms won't starve.

If you have only had the wormery for a month, then a cereal bowl full 3 times a week is too much.

Your rule of thumb is:- worms can eat half their body weight per day, so if you started off with 500g worms per week they could technically eat over 1.5 kgs per week. However this presumes that everything is perfect. (weather - worm bin health)

Your wormery has to be established, this takes about a month - to get all the correct bugs, bacteria, moulds ect working in the wormery.
Its a little self contained ecosystem

If you add too much food at the beginning it just sits there and starts to rot, and eventually smell.
Your worms won't like it, and will move away, before you know it the worms have gone and you have a smelly slimy mess.

1st make sure that what you do put in in chopped small - this give a bigger surface area for the bacteria to work on.

2nd, add a large handful of food into each corner every 3 days, when all 4 corners are full, stop and wait for the food to start breaking down.

3rd ensure that the food (the whole surface) is covered in damp shredded paper, the worms will live under this. you should be able to pull it back and see the worms dissapear from sight

4th when the food is breaking down (and visibly going) and the worms are amongst it, add another handful.

You will notice after a few months that the worms are breeding (worm eggs will appear), the food is breaking down within days, so you can start giving them more and more - never more than they can handle though.

as I said at the beginning its better to underfeed than overfeed.

Hope that helps a little, slow down your feeding !!

Ronnie

 

Thanks Ronnie, that was very comprehensive!

Just one question tho - if I've got a moisture mat, do i still need shredded paper on top?

 

Don't bother with moisture mats - they are a gimmick, You want your worms to eat your waste - not moisture mats - which they will eventually do

Wait until your worms have / started eating them, then add the paper on top

paper / moisure mats do the same thing.
they keep it dark, the moisture in, and something for the worms to live under. They also help keep flies away.

Ronnie

 

yeah I know thanks, but my wormery came with one so I'm using it. I'm not spending money on any more of these, oh no, this old trick won't work here