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February 19th, 2009

You are currently browsing the articles from Red Worm Composting written on February 19th, 2009.

Worm Feeding Schedule

Some good questions from Mike:

Hi Bentley, I have a couple of questions for you.
1. When do I know its time to add food scraps to the bin?
2. Should I let the scraps sit for a week or so before I do add them
to the bin?
3. I plan on being out of town for 3 weeks and will not have any way
of feeding the worms, any suggestions on what I can do?
Thank You
Mike

Hi Mike,

1) I always recommend “letting the worms be your guide” when it comes to feeding. You definitely don’t need to wait until all the food is gone (better if you DON’T do this in fact), but you also don’t want it to start piling up. If the worms seem to be actively feeding on your food pockets (where you bury food scraps) and you have some more room to add more, it shouldn’t hurt to add some more food. One thing to keep in mind here though – it is next to IMPOSSIBLE to starve your worms. They will start processing the bedding materials more quickly if there is absolutely no quality food (such as rotting food waste) in the bin.

2) I like letting scraps sit before adding them, but it’s up to you. If they already have some food in there it’s not that big a deal to add fresh stuff, assuming you aren’t in a rush to get your scraps processed. In fact, adding fresh material can be a nice way to add ’slow-release’ food to your system, which brings us to #3…

3) Don’t sweat it – your worms will be totally fine! I’d recommend adding more bedding and more food (without overdoing it), including some fairly fresh stuff as mentioned in the previous response. I should however mention that worm densities can be a factor here. Generally, I am referring here to a typical home worm bin. If you have a LOT of hungry worms you may actually need to get someone to feed them while you are away.

This reminds me of a funny situation I found myself in last spring. I had to go away for several weeks and I received a 5 lb shipment of worms on the day I left!!! Luckily I had set up a fairly large system (using my usual methods, described in my videos) ahead of time, but still I was really worried since it was a lot more worms than I should have put in a bin of that size. I had visions of a mass exodus of worms from the bin while I was away, and me coming home to find them everywhere in the house!
:lol:

As it turns out, when I returned, the volume of the material in the bin was greatly reduced, there was no recognizable ‘food’ left, and the worms seemed happy as can be. In fact it looked as though they had been reproducing like crazy while I was gone as well – the material in the bin was loaded with cocoons.

Anyway, bottom-line, don’t worry about it too much. Make sure you leave them with some food and bedding when you go way, but there’s no need to overdo it.

Hope this helps
8)

Written by Bentley on February 19th, 2009 with 2 comments.
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5 Tray Worm Bin Advice

Here’s a question from Kevin:

I received as a gift a 5- tray worm farm. i have 2 lbs of
worms. I filled the first tray with coir and potting soil. now i am
ready to start my second tray. what should i put as bedding. i don’t
want to buy potting soil every tray. please give me some advice.
thanks

Hi Kevin,

To be totally honest, I’m amazed you’ve been able to keep 2 lb of worms in a single tray with coir and potting soil. I’ll assume you have also been adding food scraps as well.

Potting soil generally isn’t a great material to add to a worm bin – although it is often a lot better than garden soil. This is because it typically consists of mostly peat moss (whereas garden soil has a lot more mineral particles and thus tends to be a lot heavier and more dense, thus impeding air flow in a worm bin).

One of the risks of using commercial potting soil, by the way, is that it can contain inorganic fertilizer salts which can harm or even kill your worms. If it is old stuff that’s been exposed to many waterings (without any fertilizer being added of course), then it should be ok.

Coir can be a decent worm bedding, but it can also be pretty expensive. Aside from that – in my experience, worms don’t exactly love it either. Your best bet with coir is to moisten it well and mix it with food waste (partially decomposed preferably) and let it sit for a bit before introducing the worms.

Ok – now assuming your first tray has gradually filled up over time and it is time to move up to the next tray, the good news is that you definitely do NOT need to use either of the bedding materials you’ve been using. There are even better (free) options in my humble opinion. Shredded newsprint or shredded cardboard (corrugated and/or egg carton cardboard work best) are great choices.

What you will want to do is moisten the new bedding, then mix it with a fair amount of food waste (again, partially-decomposed stuff works best) – perhaps a ratio of 2:1, bedding:food volume. Simply add this material to the new tray then wait. As it decomposes further, the worms should start to move up into that tray – especially if the first tray has little in the way of good food for the worms by that time.

Hope this helps!
8)

Written by Bentley on February 19th, 2009 with 1 comment.
Read more articles on Reader Questions.