Auckland City has just made the change from the small recycle bins to the big wheelie bins. The old light blue bins with the hole in the bottom are perfect for making into a worm bin. Here's how: Put the bin up on a couple of bricks or bits of wood, so any liquid can drain easily out of the hole in the bottom. If you want to save the liquid to use as a fertiliser, you can put a container under to catch it. But remember the liquid fertiliser is very powerful and will burn your plants if used undiluted. For this reason don't just put the worm bin in your vege patch hoping it will automatically fertilise your veges! Now fill about 1/4 of your bin with non-tanalised wood shavings, or coconut fibre, or shredded paper, or any other fibrous bedding material (but beware anything with fungus inhibitors or other toxins!) Moisten everything down without making it too soggy. Next step: get some worms! The worms in my bin are thriving and I will happily share them.* I'm sure there are plenty of other people with established worm farms who will also be glad to share. Now start putting food scraps in your bin. The finer you chop the scraps, the faster your worms will eat them. There are some very informative web sites around telling you what you should and shouldn't put in your bin. I'm pretty tough on my worms. I expect them to eat onion skins, citrus, the whole lot! But when you're just starting out you're better to follow the rules. Finally, find some sort of lid to keep your worm farm warmish and dryish. A piece of plywood or corrugated iron weighed down with a rock? Some old carpet for warmth, and the bin kept under the eves or under your deck for dryness? Take a look and see what you have lying around that might achieve this. Hooray! You now have a completely free worm bin! By the way, I'm going to plant flowers in my recycle bin. :-) * If you would like some of my worms, you will need to pick them up from me in Avondale. Let me know through here and we can work out a way to get in touch. You will need to bring your own container (something like a 1-litre plastic yoghurt container with a lid should be about right).
Submitted by Lindis on 14 July 2008 22:45:59
Comments
Cheers Lindis, that's a great idea. I'd love to see the suburbs of Auckland overflowing with worm farms. I'll let my old flatmates know and I might be able to convince them to give it a try.
If anyone is keen to take Lindis up on the offer of some free worms, contact me and I'll put you in touch.
Submitted by Andrew on 15 July 2008 13:45:24
Thanks Andrew, that's an excellent idea. I look forward to re-homing some of my worms :)
I forgot to mention how people can harvest their beautiful, dark, crumbly compost when the worms have worked their magic.
First, you need to know that the best quality compost will be at the bottom of the bin, and will be ready to harvest in about 6 months (depending the volume of food scraps you put in, and how happy & healthy your worms are).
You also need to know that compost worms hate bright light and dry air...
And that children seem to love digging around in damp compost, chasing worms...
... now you are armed with that knowledge, it's time to harvest your compost!
Put a layer of plastic and/or thick newspaper on the ground near where you want to use your compost. Find some random children to help you upturn your worm bin onto the paper/plastic and make a worm-castle (like a sand castle.) When you take the bin away the worms will shy away from the light, and start burrowing down into the compost as fast as they can. As they burrow, you scrape off the top layer of wormless compost and put it on your garden. The worms keep burrowing and you keep collecting compost until you reach the uncomposted food scraps that used to be at the top of your bin, which now contains the majority of your worms.
Now you collect up all the food scraps and your wormy army, and put them back into your bin (on top of some new bedding material) so you can begin the process all over again.
Dig the compost into the ground thoroughly before planting anything. If possible, enlist some hens to help you with this! They will scratch about looking for escaped worms, and help to dig the compost in at the same time.
Unfortunately compost worms cannot live in your garden soil, so using them as chicken-food is a good end to their productive little lives (at least that's how I justify it to myself).
Submitted by Lindis on 15 July 2008 16:28:06
Well I just gave my first batch of worms to a lovely lady who is off to turn her recycle bin into a worm bin (thanks for referring her to me, Andrew). The new worm-farmer compared it to the old ginger-beer plants we all had as kids - you just keep dividing it up and giving it away and soon everyone has one. I hope her worms will soon multiply enough that she can hand them on to the next new farmer.
Meanwhile, I poked my head over the fence and had a chat with my neighbour. When he sees the old recycle bins lying around the streets, he stops and picks them up. He now has quite a collection with flowers, herbs and veges planted in them. He even has some well-established jonquils almost ready to flower (I think he must have started early with his re-use scheme!)
Submitted by Lindis on 19 July 2008 11:12:42
Any idea where I can get some of the "old" recycling bins?
Submitted by BellyWho on 26 December 2009 19:14:00