What to Feed Worms in A Worm Bin
When feeding worms, it is important to remember a few key tips:
- The smaller the better. Smaller pieces of food will break down faster, thus speeding up the composting process. Chopping large chunks of food to feed worms is recommended but not necessary. You can puree, freeze, or microwave food scraps before adding them to your worm composter to help break down material. Make sure that food has returned to room temperature before adding it to your worm bin.
You can chop your worm’s food to speed up the composting process - The frequency and volume that you feed worms will depend on you and your family. You can add new food to the feeding tray at any time. Worms can eat up to half their weight in food per day in a fully established, well managed vermicomposter. Make sure that worms are actively engaged in eating the food you added most recently in the top feeding tray before adding more food. If they are not, this is a sign of overfeeding. On average, most people can fill a tray in about one month. It may take shorter or longer than that depending on how much kitchen waste you generate.
Make sure your worms are engaged with the last food you added before adding more.
(Image courtesy of Albert Tansey, New Hampshire)
What to feed worms in a worm bin:
When you feed worms Always try to add equal portions of greens and browns!
Greens: Vegetable and fruit scraps, bread, pasta, coffee grounds and filters, teabags, dead plant matter from houseplants
Browns: Paper, junk mail, paper egg cartons, cardboard, dry leaves
All organic material will break down, some faster than others; however, there are some suggested foods to avoid:
Salty foods, citrus, spicy foods, oils (like those found in salad dressing), prepackaged foods with preservatives, meat and dairy products because they attract flies and can cause the vermicomposter to smell.
The Difference between BROWNS and GREENS as compost ingredients
This is a popular question among many first composters or organic gardeners. Regardless of the name, "Browns" and "Greens" are not differences in physical color. It is more technical than that. These terms are functions of the C:N (Carbon to Nitrogen) ratios in all once living creatures, plant or animal.
Browns and greens are nicknames for different types of organic matter to use in composting.
Browns to feed worms in a worm bin
Greens to feed worms in a worm bin
Browns are high in carbon or carbohydrates, thus they are organic carbon sources. These foods supply the energy that most soil organisms need to survive. Carbons also help absorb the offensive odors and capture and help prevent most of the organic nitrogen in the piles from escaping by evaporation or leaching. Carbons are also essential in the faster formation of humus from the organic matter in a composting process.
Greens are high in nitrogen or protein, thus organic nitrogen sources. These products help the composting microherd to grow, breed, and multiply fast in the piles, thus creating extreme internal temperatures in hot compost piles.
A simple test to determine if your organic matter is a "green" or a "brown", is to wet it, and wait a few days. If it stinks, it is definitely a green. If not, it's a brown.
You seem to indicate the Worm Factory is made for red wiggler worms, and my husband insists we must raise the European night crawler. Will the Worm Factory accommodate the night crawlers we have sent for?? Please help!
Olivia, Don’t worry! Yes, you can use European night crawlers in a worm bin as well. I recommend the red wiggler just because it reproduces faster, lives in more dense populations, and is a little bit better at handling fluctuations in temperature than other composting worms. The European night crawlers will work fine, though! Happy composting!
Is there any harm in using spent grains (corn/malted barley) from brewing/distilling as worm food? There is a small alcohol content in the spent grains.
Hi Lee, I know this is a late reply, but I throw my spent grains/hops in my worm bin w/ no ill effects.
Worms love the grains, but be careful because they’re high in nitrogen, which means they can heat up pretty quickly when decomposing – you don’t want your worm composter to get too hot! Don’t add a lot at any one time, watch for worms stressing out (if they change behavior that might be why), and be aware that the grains can be smelly.
If fruit has started to ferment a little bit, can it still be put in as food for the worms or will it hurt them?
Michelle – It should be fine, but I’d add only a little bit at a time, with plenty of dry shredded paper.
Is it ok to put cuttings from hot peppers in for the worms?
Worms generally do not like spicy foods, so you should leave out the hot pepper cuttings. If you add them, worms will shy away from them and they can start to smell funky because nobody’s eating them.
I know that I can never use leaves from bay, eucalyptus and magnolia trees as well as needles from pine, fir and cedar trees, but can I use redwood needles? Are there any other leaves/needles I should never use?
I set up my Worm Factory 360 according to the directions and the worms seem to be doing fine. It’s been about a month. My questiion is do I add more bedding to the tray? The initial bedding is covered by a few sheets of moist newspaper and appears to be shrinking. So, am I supposed to add more bedding under the moist newspaper?
Mark: You don’t need to add more coconut coir fibers or pumice right now, but every time you feed you should add some dry shredded paper, paper egg carton, or cardboard to the bin. This will help soak up excess moisture from the food and will help add airspace to the container. Add it under the moist newspaper sheets. It’s normal that the material in the bin seems to be shrinking – as worms process the food it breaks down and becomes smaller. This is why it takes a decent amount of time (1-2 months) to fill each tray.
Hi – I have had my worm factory for a couple weeks now. They seem to be doing okay although I have a couple questions.
First – As I add food to the bin should I stir it in or just lay it on top? I have been mixing it in and spreading it around. The last couple days I noticed they were in the middle of the bin and not really moving around too much, so what is the best way to add my kitchen scraps?
Secondly – I noticed a few dead worms in the very bottom of the ladder bin – what would cause this?
Sharon – When you add food to the bin, you should be able to just lift the moist paper covering and place the food below that, on the bedding/other food. You shouldn’t need to stir it in unless you are noticing a foul odor which means your bin might need to be aerated. This rarely happens. Just add the food under the cover on the bedding and they should be fine. Disturbing their bedding a lot can make them stressed out, hence the gathering in the center.
A few dead worms here and there is nothing to worry about, but if you see a large number of them you should be concerned. Worms die of any number of causes: old age, being stranded without food or moisture, being too hot or too cold, etc… It doesn’t sound to me like you have a mass death on your hands, so I think they’re probably just done with their natural cycle. Keep an eye on them and let me know if you notice more than a few dead ones at any given time.
Hello! We have had our worms, super reds, in the worm factory 360 for about 10 months. They are in an area with very little noise/traffic that stays between 60-70 F. The initial instructions said to put newspaper in the bottom most tray. We only put food in the upper most tray and we now have 3 trays with no visable food left in the bottom tray However, some of them keep eating the newspaper from the bottom tray and then going down to the bottom (worm ladder) area. (At first I kept replacing it, thinking that it was the worm eggs that were falling through.) I mostly find the really small ones in the bottom. Is this normal? Do we have suicidal worms? (If so, what can be done?) Are the little ones just not big enough to use the ladder? Are we supposed to leave the dirt/castings on the ladder to help provide mobility – or is scooping them out just part of vermicomposting? How will I know when the tray is ready to have the castings removed? (Do we just pick out the worms and help them to the next bin?) Many thanks!
Dianne,
It sounds like you’re ready to harvest your bottom tray! Here is an article on how to do it: http://www.naturesfootprint.com/harversting-finished-vermicompost
It is fine for some worms to be down in the collection area after a while because that paper in the bottom does decompose. Don’t worry about it!
When I feed my worms should the carbon component (leaves, paper, ect.) be mixed in dry or should I moisten the paper first. Also, is the 50% carbon determined by weight or volume
The carbon should be mixed in dry unless your bin is very dry anyway (normally bins run on the wet side, though). Determine the amount by volume.
I noticed that “citrus” was in the list of foods not to give composting worms. One of the main reasons I wanted to start vernicomposting was that I end up with a LOT of orange and lime peels from juicing citrus fruits. Can I put small amounts of citrus peels and/or fruit into a worm farm, along with other foods, or will the worms just ignore even small amounts?
If I compost the citrus peels in a tumbled, non-worm composter with leaves, grass, weeds, etc., can composting worms live in the resulting compost and be fed other kitchen wastes while living in it? If you know? Thanks for any info!
Letitia,
You can add very small amounts of citrus to the worm composter. The reason we recommend against it is that worms don’t have the proper enzymes to digest citrus very efficiently. You can compost the peels in a larger composter and the worms will do fine in the resulting compost.
Are coffee grounds considered Brown? Also, is it Ok that some of the fruit has mold? I added berries that were too ripe and they seem to have gone moldy in the bin.
Victoria – coffee grounds are considered Greens because of their carbon to nitrogen ratio. It is ok that some fruit has mold on it – mold is another living organism just like worms that helps to break down organic material. If you are noticing a lot of mold that means the food is probably sitting untouched by worms for too long, but a little mold here and there on occasion is ok. You can read the section on Molds and Fungi here for more information: http://www.naturesfootprint.com/community/articles/billions-microorganisms-worm-bin
Hope that answers your questions! Happy composting.