Create Compost by Building Your Own Worm Box

You might dump your kitchen scraps into the plastic composter at the back corner of the yard and forget about them, but those compost bins are often an inefficient way to reduce food scraps into usable organic material. The food can sit there for months or even years, especially in colder climates, without breaking down properly.

A quick and easy way to compost kitchen scraps year-round is to use a worm box, which is called vermicomposting or vermiculture. This is a great way to turn your unwanted kitchen waste into black gold by leveraging a gardener's best friends: worms.

Build the Box

The easiest way to build your bin is to use a 10- to 20-gallon plastic storage tub, the kind you might store your winter clothes or extra sheets in. A wooden box also works well. Once you have your bin, follow these steps.

1. Drill 20 to 25 small holes (about 1/4 inch in diameter) in the bottom of the bin. These will drain excess liquid from the box. You can collect those drippings in a pan or bucket to provide nutrient-rich ?compost tea" for the garden.

2. Create ventilation for your worms by drilling two rows of 1/16-inch holes near the top of the box. Do the same with the lid by drilling about 30 evenly spaced 1/16-inch holes.

3. Shred a few newspapers (no colored ink) or untreated cardboard into 1-inch strips and soak them in water for a few minutes. Squeeze out all the water from each strip so it's as wet as a wrung-out sponge. Place the paper in the bottom of the bin and fluff it up until the box is about two-thirds full.

4. Add about a quart of soil from your garden. Since they don't have teeth, worms need grit to help grind up the food in their gizzard. The microbes and organisms in the soil help the composting process as well.

5. Dig about halfway down into the bedding and bury your worms. Red wigglers work best, and you can buy them at your local garden store.

Feed the Worms

Bury a small amount of food scraps, just a few banana peels and apple cores to start, in the bedding at a corner of the box. Start slowly to give the worms a chance to settle into their new home. Under optimal conditions they can eat about half their weight in food every day.

Treat the worms like vegans. Fruit, vegetables, and grains, coffee grounds and filters, tea bags and eggshells are all okay. Avoid meat, fish, dairy, citrus, cooking oils, and animal waste. (These will smell bad and attract bugs). Make sure the food is buried at least 6 inches into the bedding to avoid fruit flies, and pick a different spot to bury the food each time to give the worms enough time to eat what you've already buried.

If the bin gets too moist, add more paper and ease up on the food. If it's too dry, dampen slightly with water. If it starts to smell, that means either the food isn't buried deep enough or there is too much food and the worms are deprived of oxygen. Hold off putting scraps in the bin for about a week and the problem should correct itself.

Depending on the size, the worm box can live just about anywhere in your house. Ideal temperature conditions range between 60 and 75 degrees Fahrenheit. Usually the compost is ready to harvest after three to six months, depending on the size of your bin. It should be about two-thirds of the way full of fresh soil once it's ready. Don't wait too long to harvest, because the worms may start to die if exposed to too much of their castings for too long.

To harvest the soil, stop feeding the worms for a few days to allow them to finish whatever scraps might remain. Dump the contents onto a tarp and sort through the pile to remove the worms. Allow the compost to dry in the open air. Remember to spread out the pile to avoid big clumps of dried compost. Return the worms to their box and start the process over again.

Source: http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/environment/recycling/create-compost-by-building-your-own-worm-box-15207713?src=rss

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