Building a new wormery for the lodges

We’re busier than we’ve ever been, and our green cone digesters are over filling. What to do? Sure, we can remind people to slim the bin. But there’s still going to be food waste from the eco lodges.

So we’re hoping a new wormery will speed up the break down process. We’ll be decanting some of the semi-digested green cone waste into the new contraption near the bike shed. It’s been made (from the bottom up) out of an old farm tank we had knocking around, a recycled tap (for the worm waste), a good layer of stones, a sheet of plastic with holes in it, some garden compost, a thin scattering of kitchen scraps and, as a starter, 500g of worms from Wiggly Wigglers. On top of that goes a layer of wet tabloid papers (good use for them…) Finally, there’s a lid to keep the rain out but let the air in.

The worms were the expensive bit (over £20). And perhaps we could have got some from the cones. But we wanted to get ahead on the year and certainly ordinary earth worms aren’t much good – you need brandling or tiger worms. You can dig them out of a mature compost heap, buy them from a fishing shop, or order composting worms online.

There are lots of online resources on building wormeries, from tiny ones in a box to farm scale ‘vermiculture’. Here’s what seemed to stand out to us.

Build in a tap or holes at the bottom so you can drain off any ‘liquor’.
Cover the top of the compost with something damp – newspaper, a towel etc.
Put a lid on the whole thing to keep the rain out.
The worms eat the fungi that grow on the decomposing food, rather than getting stuck into a broccoli stalk on its own, so you need conditions that help things rot.
They come up to the top ‘scraps’ layer to feed, but otherwise they like to live a bit deeper in the compost they’re busy making.
Worms like most kitchen scraps, but not too much of any one thing, and particularly not lots of citrus, onions or garlic.
Your worm population could double every 3 months or so, given the right conditions…
…which are damp and dark and not too much over feeding. Get it wrong and they will either die or desert.
Leave air holes, but not vermin holes, and keep it in the shade in summer, adding water occasionally if it starts to look dry.