Garden Medley

If you’re an avid gardener, you know how important worms are to your garden. You may also have had trouble getting what you feel to be enough worms into your garden. Worms help to aerate your soil, break down organic matter so that plants can use the nutrients and break up clods of dirt.

Have you ever considered farming your own worms? It’s actually not that hard.

You can buy a worm farm that will help you to grow your own worms. Alternatively, you can use a concrete laundry tub. You will need to remove the plug and cover the hole with a screen to allow for drainage, but otherwise it will not need much adaptation.

To get started, mix compost with some dolomite or agricultural lime, and add to about a half bucket of soil. Add water until water starts to drip from the bottom of the tub. Add your worms. Cover with wet cardboard, as worms love to be wet, dark and moist. You can purchase your starter worms if necessary from a worm breeder or your local garden supply.

Keep the farm moist, but not so wet that your worms drown. Add compost regularly, along with a spoonful of the dolomite or agricultural lime. To make the compost easy for the worms to eat, you may need to use a blender. Worms love household scraps, with the exception of meat, onion and citrus. A coffee can with a good, tight sealing lid, can be a good place to keep the scraps for a short time… but if you have a compost pile you may be more comfortable just taking the scraps out of the house immediately.

Softer food, such as old potatoes and fruit, can just be placed on the top for the worms to eat. Worms also enjoy old, shredded and soaked cardboard. Make sure you avoid anything in the onion family, as the worms really cannot stand the oils from them, and will try to get out of the farm.

You can set up a second farm much as you did the first. Then plug the drain and fill the first about halfway with water to encourage the worms to move to the top. Take the ones you need for your garden, moving the rest to the second tub. The first tub now has excellent fertilizer for your garden.

Repeat this process monthly, and you will have marvelous organic fertilizer for your garden, saving the trouble of using chemicals. It’s better for your garden, better for you and better for the planet.