The worm farm is the place you breed your worms and get your castings. By throwing in stuff that you have planned to throw away, you could turn your rubbish to golden waste: worm castings. So, how do you go about making a compost bin?

Firstly, you would have to find a container to contain your worm farm. The dimensions of your worm farm is completely up to you, though if you plan to move it around often, it would be best to use a container that could fit into your arms. It would be ideal to use either wood or plastic containers. However, if you are using a plastic container, it is highly recommended to cover the sides of the container with opaque materials to block out the light travelling into the worm farm. This is because worms prefer dark places, and we should keep them happy in a conducive environment so they would diligently produce castings.

Secondly, you would have to create bedding for your worm farm. The things you should include into the worm farm include damp garden soil and moistened newspapers. Do take note that the bedding cannot be too wet, as worms need moisture to breathe though they would drown if there is too much water in the worm farm. The bedding should be able to clump together when squeezed, but not to the extent where you could squeeze a lot of water out. The amount of bedding used should fill up to between one-quarter to half of the worm farm.

Next, you can start adding the worms into the worm farm. You should only use blue or red worms, and not earthworms. Earthworms are not able to produce castings for use as fertilizers.

Do not feed the worms for the first three days, so that they would have to dig into the bedding to look for food and settle into their new environment properly. The newspapers you have added in the worm farm should be sufficient for the worms to survive on for the next few days. Meanwhile, open the lid of the worm farm and shine light into the worm farm to ensure the worms would keep down and not escape out of the worm farm.

After three days, move your worm farm to a dark place. Never expose your worm farm to direct sunlight as you may kill them. The ideal temperature for the worms would be at room temperature. You could start feeding them as well at this point. What should you feed the worms with? You could throw almost anything organic into the worm farm, but you would have to keep in mind to maintain the overall worm farm pH to around 7. Thus, excessive acidic materials such as orange or lemon peel are discouraged. Leftover cooked food is discouraged as well, as they would lead to odors when they decompose. The food you throw into the worm farm should have approximately the same mass as the mass of the worms you have in the worm farm because the worms can eat roughly their own body weight daily. Do not overfeed as it may cause odors too.

Remember to always keep the worm farm well ventilated as the worms need to take in enough oxygen. Thus, you should make holes at the sides of the worm farm, though the holes should not be too big as the worms might escape from the worm farm through the holes.

By following the instructions above, you should be able to keep your worms happy enough to produce castings within a month! Have fun and good luck!