Composting worms or vermicomposting is an environmentally friendly option to reduce food scrap waste & create nutritious, rich compost for the garden. The worms feed on a combination of green or nitrogen based additions (coffee grounds, crushed eggshells, fruit & veggie scraps) & browns or carbon based additions (shredded paper, egg cartons & cardboard). The worms have quite the appetite & eat half their own weight in food every day, we feed ours every other day or when the kitchen scrap bin is full. 10 months ago, we started our worm farm using an old bathtub, well-rotted horse manure, cardboard & 500 worm eggs, since then our worm population has exploded.
To prevent our bathtub farm becoming overcrowded we decided to add some of the excess worms to our veggie garden. The addition of worms to garden beds is beneficial to plant health, the worms tunneling provides air pockets which delivers oxygen to plant roots while the waste worms excrete provides valuable nutrients to the plants & helps bind soil particles together improving soil structure. However, composting worms unlike earthworms, eat rotting organic matter & need access to a source of food. For this reason, we also added garden-based feeding stations (or worm tunnels) to our garden beds. These provide a vermin proof location for us to dispense scraps for the worms to feast on while also allowing them to vacate the tunnel to lay eggs & defecate.
Making a garden-based worm feeding station
For our project we used some plastic planter pots with the water collecting dishes as a lid. You can get creative here, reuse planter containers from your plant purchases, old buckets, PVC pipes or bottles. You just need to ensure the material is opaque or well covered (the worms like it dark) & that the top can be secured to keep pests like rats, birds & possums out.
Using a drill, sharp box knife or scissors (be careful not to cut yourself) add holes large enough for the worms to fit through approximately halfway up the base of your container. This will provide sufficient drainage to prevent the worms from drowning & allow the worms to come & go from the tunnel freely.
Dig a hole in your garden bed large enough to fit your container. We used larger containers in our bigger beds but you could do multiple farms per bed if you like. We also placed them in the center of the bed, this is generally a more difficult area to harvest from so we tend not to plant much in this area anyway. Add the container to the hole & back fill the soil so that the container sits flush with the top of the soil with the lid on.
Add worms, some soil, green & brown feed, water in & pop on the lid. It’s that simple!
Feeding station maintenance
Simply lift the lid & drop in scraps to feed. Since our lids are plastic this doesn’t allow water to penetrate the tunnels. Before watering the garden, remove the lids so the worms can get a good soaking too. Make sure you remember to add the lids back on afterwards.
After a few weeks your feeding stations should look happy & healthy like our one below. The worm population would have increased & there should be more worms in the surrounding garden bed too.
Happy Gardening!