Our community garden set up a vermiculture bin for the first time earlier this year. In March we ordered some worms from Uncle Jim's Worm Farm and drilled holes in two giant Rubbermaid plastic bins that had previously been used to hold holiday decorations. My kids helped me load the worms into their new home.
We let them get settled in some coconut coir for a week and then started feeding them table scraps. It turns out that worms like leafy greens in abundance, fruits in moderation and acidic foods (like coffee grinds and lemons) sparingly.
Every week the worms would get more table scraps. We'd bury them in the coconut coir and then cover them with shredded paper. This kept the flies down, who also enjoy snacking on table scraps.
After about 6 months the worms had made a bin of beautiful rich dark compost.
I'd say our vermiculture trial has been a success! Now we have a large bin full of worm castings for our garden plants and we've rehomed the worms in a new bin with fresh table scraps so they can keep up with their important work of transforming our vegetable food waste into nutrient dense compost for our next garden harvest!
