Composting with Worms

Although I lived on a small farm and had a lot of experience with different kinds of farm animals, I had never really thought about composting in a big way, mainly because I did not have a green thumb, and didn't care much for gardening.

One day, however, while buying rabbits, I met a man who got me interested. He had a large barn full of rabbits that he sold, and under the rabbit cages, the whole length of the barn ran wooden bins that he raised worms in. It was fascinating to see, and when I asked, he gave me a tour of how he raised worms for compost. He showed me his large cylinder barrel with screen sides that he would scoop the composted dirt into. He would then turn this with a handle, and the composted worm castings would drop out. When that was done, left in the cylinder was a tangled mass of worms, which he would redeposit back into his wooden bins to compost some more.

He said that gardeners bought both the worms and the casting, and he had made more than $3,000 selling these the month before.

So far, I have not reached the point of selling worms and castings, but I have enjoyed keeping worm bins off and on since that time. It's an easy thing to do, whether you have a farm or just a small bin under your kitchen cabinet or on your back porch.

To start, select what you want to keep your compost in. Wooden containers are best, but plastic bins will also do. Just be sure there is plenty of ventilation, and with plastic, you will have to be careful the material doesn't get too wet, so it won't rot. You can punch holes in the sides of the container for this purpose. Here at my own farm at this time, I am using two old horse troughs that have holes in them.

First lay newspaper, paper towels, or torn up cardboard on the bottom of the bin. Moisten it well, and add leaves, yard clippings, and/or live stock manure. Moisten again (do not over wet) and you are ready to add your worms. Red worms are the best worms for bin composting. You can easily find them online, or you might visit your local farmer and see if he will let you look in his manure pile for them. Get a pound or two, and add these to your bin. Then lay shredded, wet newspaper on top.

Save your kitchen scraps, you can add just about anything except for meat and oil. These will rot and attract rats and other pests. Dig a hole in the material in the bin, and bury the food scrapes. In a few weeks, your bin will be full of worms, and you will see rich, dark, fine soil in place of the material you started with. When this happens, you can begin to harvest your worm castings.

There are several ways to harvest. You can use an old window screen. Scoop some of the material onto the screen, and gently shake, allowing the worm castings to fall through into whatever container you want them in. Once you have the castings, replace the worms into the bin.

Another way is to dump the contents a bit at a time and use your hands to go through and remove the worms and food that hasn't composted yet. Put these back into the bin, and save the composted soil into a box or bag.

You can also quit adding food scraps to the bin for a few days, then push all the soil over to one side of your container. Put fresh bedding and fresh scraps on the other side, and wait a couple of weeks. The worms will move over to the side with the fresh bedding and food, and you can use harvest the compost on the old side.

If you want to raise a worm bin under rabbits, it's a good idea to add a little lime once in a while to counteract the urine from the rabbits. The worms will eat the rabbit droppings and the food they spill, and you can add cornmeal and coffee grounds, and of course, other food scraps you have left over.

Raising worms is a fun thing to do, and good teaching experience for your children. And if you want to go at it in a big way, you could make extra money from them.