Begin Composting

Worms

The best kind of worms for composting are redworms or red wigglers. They are often found in old compost piles, but are different from the earthworms more often found in the ground. Their scientific names are Eisenia fetida and Lumbricus rubellus. Common earthworms and night crawlers don't survive well in bins. Red worms thrive in confinement and reproduce quickly.

The number of worms you want depends on the amount of food waste you want to compost. The ratio of food waste per day to worms is 1:2 since worms eat half of their body weight per day. For two people (with their 3.5 lbs of food waste per week) 1 lb of worms (or 1000 worms) is perfect.

After the bedding is in place, simply add the worms (and any soil they come with) and feed them their first meal. You can purchase redworms at some gardening stores, bait and tackle shops (see the Yellow Pages), and gardening mail-order outlets.

We also recommend contacting God's Gang, a community group based on the south side of Chicago, which sells and delivers redworms. Click here for their website or call God's Gang: 773-264-2652 (cell: 773-213-6992).

You can feed your worms daily, but it's usually more convenient to collect your food waste in a bucket and add it to your worm bin weekly. Bury the food waste into the bedding, alternating the area you bury it each time. If the worms don't seem to be eating the food, feed them less, if no uneaten food is visible, feed them more.

Harvesting and Using your Compost

When you notice that the bedding has been eaten (after you have been feeding your worms for 2 to 4 months) it's time to harvest the compost. The compost will be well-textured granules, which are actually worm castings, or excrement, which needs to be removed so worms can continue to proliferate. Here are a couple of methods for collecting the compost.

Method 1: Move the contents of your worm bin to one side, place fresh bedding on the empty side and bury your food waste in the new bedding for a month or so. The worms will migrate to the new side and you will be able to take out the finished compost.

Method 2: Spread a sheet of newspaper or plastic out under a bright light or the sun. Dump the contents of the worm bin into a number of piles onto the sheet. The worms will crawl away from the light and gather at the bottom center of each pile. Separate the worms from the compost.

After you have harvested the compost, you can set up the bin again using the same worms and new bedding. At this point you will have more worms than you started with; you can add some of them to a garden, use them for fishing, or pass them on to a friend to start up a worm bin. But don't worry about too many worms; the population is self-regulating.

(This brochure is based in part on material published by the San Francisco League of Urban Gardeners.)

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