Trouble Shooting - Worm Composters

Worms are an efficient way to quickly compost a variety of food and other organic scraps found around the home. In nature worms are natural composters found in fields and on forest floors. 

Red wiggler worms are the preferred worm for vermicomposting. Common earthworms are not good for compost bins. They burrow with their food before they eat and prefer to live deep underground. Red wiggler worms live 6"-12" from the surface and eat on the go which makes them ideal for compost trays. Red wigglers also reproduce faster and can thrive in a larger temperature range than common earthworms.

Setup and Start

DAY 1 - Make the bedding and let your worms get accustomed to their new home.

• When you first get the composter add a few layers of wet newsprint to the bottom tray.
• Soak the coconut fiber and shredded paper to create moist, fluffy bedding. Add this to the bottom tray as well.
• Add worms to the bottom tray.
• Place the empty tray and lid onto the unit and leave it for a day.

When you first add the worms to their new home, they will be very active and need about a day to calm down. The newsprint in step 1 is added to prevent the worms from falling through the holes into the base. You only need to do this the first time you add worms because once they figure out where the food is they will say in the tray.

The worms don't like light. If you leave a light on above the composter overnight, it will help keep the worms from escaping.

DAY 2 - Start Adding Food

• Once the worms have calmed down you can start adding food scraps to the bedding.
• It’s best to bury the scraps in the bedding to make the food easier to find.

AFTER SEVERAL WEEKS - Moving the worms between trays:

• It will take several weeks for the worms to eat through all the bedding, paper, and food scraps. As you continuously add food to the bottom tray it will fill up. Once the bottom tray is full, and the dirt is touching the upper tray, it’s time to move the worms.
• Make more bedding for the upper tray with more coconut fiber and more shredded paper. We want the worms to pass through the holes so don’t add the newsprint.
• Start adding scraps only to the upper tray. The worms will move upwards to follow the food.
• Check the lower tray after a week. Once all the worms have moved you can remove the lower tray to harvest the compost.

Now the upper tray with the worms becomes the new lower tray and the cycle continues from there.

 

Things To Remember

• Do not overfeed. Excess food creates excess water which will slow down the composting process and reduce the worm population.
• Always bury your food scraps. The worms will find the food faster if it is buried .
• In order for the worms to migrate upwards stop feeding in the lower tray and add food to the upper tray only. The bedding in the lower tray will need to contact the migration channels in the upper tray to allow the worms to relocate.
• Drain reservoir base as necessary.
• To speed the process you can create a slurry of food scraps in your blender mixed with equal parts fiber (newsprint, napkins, etc)
• Add a small amount of baking yeast to the surface of the tray. Yeast contains vitamins for healthy worms.
• Your composter should be placed in a covered location that is not too hot. If people are comfortable then the worms should be too. On hot days make sure the bedding stays moist. 

Managing Moisture and Airflow

Keeping a balanced moisture level is critical to healthy reproductive worms. 

The Squeeze Test. Take a handful of compost material and squeeze it as hard as you can with both hands. If a few drops of water escape between your fingers you have an ideal moisture level. A stream of water indicates the mix is too wet. Any less and it is too dry.

If your Living Composter is too wet. Add dry fibers such as coconut coir, peat moss, shredded paper, cardboard, etc to absorb the excess moisture.

If your Living Composter is too dry. Recycle water from the reservoir base or spray with a small amount of fresh water.

 

 

Do I use all the coconut coir for the first batch of bedding?

Whether you use all your coconut coir at once depends on your available materials and how long you need the initial coco fiber to last.

There are lots of different “recipes” to make your own worm bedding at home. Coco fiber is a good choice but there are other options.

No Extra Bedding – If you do not have other bedding materials like shredded paper, peat, or shredded cardboard, you should use all the coconut coir.

Mixed Bedding – If you are making a custom "recipe," you can use the coir as a component (typically 20%–40% of the total mix) alongside other “ingredients”

Emergency – Some keepers recommend saving some dry coir to help absorb excess moisture if the bin becomes too wet.

 Either way you’ll need to get something for worm bedding after a few trays. The coir that comes with the unit is just enough to make the first tray of bedding.

 

My worms are escaping through the gaps in the trays. What do I do?

The composter trays are supposed to have gaps for airflow. That’s not a defect. If the pieces fit together too perfectly the compost would get too wet and the worms would drown.

1)  Is the composter new or have you had it for a while? The worms will often go exploring when they are first added to the unit, but once they realize the food comes to the trays they usually stay put. Leaving a light on above the unit is an option. Worms don’t like the light and will stay in the unit to avoid it.

2)  Did you buy red wiggler worms or European nightcrawlers? Red Wigglers are best for composters since they like to feed in the top few inches of soil. Nightcrawlers are larger (and much better for fishing) but they like to dive deeper with their food. If you have large Nightcrawler worms that could be why they’re trying to escape the shallow trays.

3) If you’ve had the unit for a while and the worms are still trying to escape, they are probably trying to avoid something in the bedding.

A)  They don’t like living in the compost they create - it’s their poop. If the bedding and scraps have mostly turned into compost they might be trying to find fresh bedding to live in. You should harvest one of the trays and move the worms to fresh bedding. (Or if the tray isn’t full enough to reach the next tray add more bedding to the existing tray.)

B)  If the bedding isn’t to their liking that is another reason they might be trying to escape:

• Too dry – add more scraps (or some water)
• Not enough food – If there are far more worms than food they are likely trying to find something to eat. If you have a blender you could puree some scraps. Adding a blended slurry of scraps will make the food available faster.
• Too wet – add more dry bedding to soak up the excess moisture. The worms will drown if the bedding gets too wet so they will try to escape if the bedding is very wet.
• Too much food – overfeeding the worms is bad as well. If the food is rotting faster than the worms can eat it the bedding will get very wet which the worms will try to avoid.
• Too acidic – Foods such as coffee grounds, citrus peels, or anything with vinegar are acidic. Coffee grounds are OK in small doses but if you’re adding a lot of acidic foods the worms will try to escape to avoid them.
• Too salty – French fries, potato chips, etc. Worms don’t like salt and will try to escape to avoid it.
• Meats, fats, bones, oils – you shouldn’t add too many of these scraps either. They take much longer to break down and could end up rotting before they are ready for the worms to eat which is something else they might be trying to avoid.