Worms are the fastest natural composters and eat about half their body weight everyday. You will see the evidence of where they are working by the tiny flecks of compost in your kit which will be all through the waste and on the sides of your kit. You will see this builds up faster in the lower trays and the worms will gradually migrate upwards working through the fresher waste.

To ensure they are as efficient as possible there are couple ways of encouraging them to get a wiggle on!

1: Add your waste regularly and chop it up where practical (the more surface area there is the easier the worms can eat it. As long as they are working somewhere within the top few centimetres of your kit it is fine to add more waste. Keep a moisture mat on top for best results.

2: Add an extra tray. Worms like to work all over your kit and so if you add an extra tray there will be more space – and this means the worms will breed more and eat more waste. The other way to encourage a healthy population is to use Rock Dust (in very small quantities) it contains the essential minerals and trace elements required for healthy growth in your Composting Worms.

Of course, your worms are not a waste disposal machine (!) so if you find you have lots of waste that you could recycle but your worms just can’t stick the pace it is really worth considering Bokashi. This is a Japanese method of fermenting waste which can deal with large quantities (including challenging waste like meat and cooked food!) and even gluts of waste which worms can find very difficult. Bokashi doesn’t produce a lovely friable worm cast but it does produce a very effective fertiliser and it does work alongside your worms brilliantly. The best option is a KIT as this means whilst you are filling one bin you are fermenting another so the cycle is continuous. Read more here!

In the meantime, you will probably be starting to use your liquid feed now. Worm tea is an excellent liquid fertilizer for herbs and indoor plants as well as the garden. It contains high amounts of nutrients and enzymes that promote growth and help build plant resistance against pests. You can collect worm tea in a plastic or glass bottle. It's ideal to dilute it with 10 parts water. Use the diluted worm tea for watering plants or spray it on their foliage.

For more help with Worm Composting please visit our Wiggly Wizard knowledge base here https://wiggly-wigglers-faq.malcolm.app/

Or if you want more info about purchasing a wormery or starting worm composting please pop on over to https://www.wigglywigglers.co.uk/collections/worm-composting