Expert Advice

The most effective way to rid your worm farm of undesirable creepy crawlies is to add a sprinkle of dolomite a couple of times a week.  We have our Worm Farm & Compost Conditioner, which will balance the PH levels in your worm farm; effectively making the environment ideal for your worms and uncomfortable for any other organisms.  You can purchase this through your local Bunnings Warehouse.

I recommend doing the following if you have an insect infestation:
Get a small hand fork, and dig and ‘fluff’ up (aerate) the top feeding tray.
Sprinkle on a couple of teaspoons of Dolomite Lime (“Compost & Worm Farm Conditioner).
Get into the practice of adding a few handfuls of good soil on top of the food scraps every time you feed your worms.
Ensure that you have a ‘worm blanket’ on the surface of the feeding tray at all times.

I hope this helps.

It is not unusual that worms fall or travel down into the collector tray at times.  The Worm Café is designed with a refuge island in the base tray to assist with the worms finding their way back up to the working tray.

We suggest that you keep the tray open at all times to properly drain the unit and avoid any possible drowning.  

Worms are known as 'explorers', therefore if they are not hungry they may simply be having a look around the collector tray.  It is a possibility that the worms will travel down into the collector tray to simply look around their environment.  If they are not readily finding their way back up to the working tray, you could place either a brick or an upside down empty ice cream tub in the middle of the collector tray to enable them to travel back up.

Alternatively, if there is a piece of non preferred food that has found its way into the unit, the worms may be travelling away from this or any other organisms this may have attracted.

During the cooler weather the worms will lose their appetite, therefore it may be that you are feeding them more than they can digest.  This can be fixed by not adding any scraps to your worm farm for 1-2 weeks and monitoring whether the worms make their way up to the working tray in their search for food.

We recently had a question from Garry who had to move is worm farm and now has flies and ants, and it smells bad. Garry has plenty of worm action and lots of micro bugs etc. Can he rejuvenate his worm farm to its former glory?

Flies, ants and a bad smell indicate that your worms are overfed. The excess food has become anaerobic, which means there is not enough oxygen.

The good news is you can easily rejuvenate your worm farm to its ‘former glory’!

The ‘flies’ you mentioned are most likely ‘vinegar flies’. These small flies are attracted to gases given off by anaerobic microbes. To get rid of them, I suggest you:

• Use a small hand fork to dig and ‘fluff’ up – or aerate – the top feeding tray
• Sprinkle a couple of teaspoons of Worm Farm & Compost Conditioner on top of the food scraps
• Add a few handfuls of good soil on top of the food scraps every time you feed your worms
• Ensure you have a worm blanket on the surface of the feeding tray at all times
• Pour several litres of water through your worm farm every week – but before you do, install a bucket under the tap on the bottom tray. Open the tap and keep it open all the time to collect any worm ‘tea’ that drips out.

To encourage the ants to leave your worm farm, simply disturb the area they are in by digging it up, then sprinkle on some extra Worm Farm & Compost Conditioner

Worm Regards

Pete Rutherford

I always keep the lowest working tray as the worms’ ‘home’ and use the tray above to fill with food scraps and soil. By the time this upper tray is full (after a few months), most of the worms have moved into it. At this point, I remove the lower tray, empty it of castings then hose it out and rotate it to the top of the worm farm. Then I start again, by adding food and soil to the clean top tray.

When it comes to feeding your garden, place small amounts of castings on planted areas or mix castings with water in a bucket then pour it around the plants. Always cover the castings with mulch.

The most important rule is to use less castings around your younger plants and more around the established plants.

All the best with your worms and garden.

The short answer is Yes, but there are some issues to consider before you do!

Fresh, soft, green, leafy weeds (also called ‘wild herbs’) are higher in protein/nitrogen and are more like your kitchen scraps, so the worms will like these.

Make sure the VOLUME of weeds/wild herbs you put in is LESS than the volume of kitchen scraps you put in.

Still continue to add a few handfuls of nice soil on top of the kitchen scraps and also on top of the soft green weeds/wild herbs you put in. Worms need the soil ‘grit’ to put into their ‘Gizzard’ to grind their food. (Remember – Worms do not have teeth!)

Old dry, woody weeds with seeds on them are best NOT put into your worm farm. It is best to compost these or give them to your chooks, or if you cannot do that then put them into your local garden waste recycling system.

Add a little sprinkle (half teaspoon) of ‘Worm Farm and Compost Conditioner’, every week or two, to allow the worms to keep the pH in good balance.

Remember if you get any ANAEROBIC (bad smelling) gases coming from your worm farm then you are most likely OVERFEEDING your worms.  Stop feeding them for a week or so. Dig gently and mix up the top layer of the feeding tray. This will help with aeration.

Please let me know if you encounter any problems, with any particular types of ‘weeds/wild herbs’. We can then let other people know.

Thanks for taking good care of your worms and for caring for our earth! 

Eco Logos ( Ecology = I will take care of everywhere I go!)

Worm Regards

Pete Rutherford

We have recently received some good questions about the Bokashi Bucket scraps. I have trialled and managed a Bokashi Bucket, but we composted the contents in Tumbleweed 220L Compost Bin's. This went well, our compost bins do have a lot of worms in them so I am making an assumption that the Bokashi scraps will be fine in the worm farm. My main question to consider though, and I would like you feedback when you try this, is that the Bokashi pH is probably quite acidic, which worms don't like too much, so I would definitely be adding a good sprinkling of the Tumbleweed Worm Farm and Compost Conditioner,to the worm farm when you add the Bokashi scraps. We always add a regular small amount of 'Conditioner' into both our worm farms and compost bins at the Eco House and Garden Education Centre.

So my short answer is yes I think that the Bokashi scraps could be added into a working worm farm. Make sure you add a sprinkling of 'Worm Farm and Compost Conditioner' in with the Bokashi contents to help balance the pH.

We recently had a question about the reason for sprinkling a hand full of soil into the worm farm with the food scraps.

So here's the answer, worms have a 'gizzard' in their neck, like birds. Worms & birds do not have teeth.

The soil added into worm farms is to ensure that the worms can get sufficient 'grit', sand and other soil particles to put into their gizzard with their food, to grind it before it goes into their stomach.

Castings – or worm poo - are great for plants in your garden or in pots.

Before you plant, dig small amounts of castings around the drip line of your fruit trees, or in your veggie garden beds and pots.

Drain the worm juice from your worm farm every week and dilute it 1 part worm juice to 10 parts water, then pour it around the base of your fruit, vege and flower plants – now, watch them come to life over the coming months!

The great news is that worms love spring – its not too cold or too hot – in fact it’s the perfect season!

As it gets warmer, the first thing they’re going to do is become more active. They’ll want to eat more which means they’ll produce more castings for your garden – and that’s just as well because rich worm tea is what your garden needs right now to get the fruit and veges flourishing!

To get the most from your composting worms, increase the amount and variety of scraps you add to your worm farm and add some extra Worm Conditioner to boost the nutritional value. Water the farm every week – that way you’ll produce the worm tea your garden needs!

If you’ve moved your worm farm to a sunny spot for the winter, now is the time to move it back into the shade – a worm farm will warm up quickly in the sun and your worms will suffer – they enjoy an environment that’s around 18-25 deg C.

Finally, check the condition of your worm blanket – with warm dry weather just around the corner, a good blanket will help keep the moisture in.

Spring is a wonderful time to use the compost that you’ve been preparing through the year, but first of all you need to make sure it’s ready to go.

The first thing to do is start a new compost heap – that way you’ll leave the existing one to mature! Then get out your ‘Compost Mate’ spiral-mixing tool and mix the old one every week – that will speed up decomposition.

As the days warm up, the microbes and worms in your compost will become more active, so they’ll need some extra nutrition. Add some extra ‘Compost Conditioner’ and a few handfuls of chicken or cow manure each week.

It’s also important to protect your compost from drying heat. Cover it up with a Tumbleweed circular Can-O-Worms blanket, a hessian sack or an old woollen jumper.

How do I know when my compost is ready?

Your compost will be ready when it’s a rich dark colour and the organic matter is completely broken down.  You’ll notice it has a beautiful earthy smell.

Use your Compost Mate to pull the most mature compost from the bottom of the pile then spread it over your garden beds and dig it in. Now its ready to plant!

PS… If you don’t have a ‘Compost Mate’ already, I suggest you get one! They are ‘the best thing since sliced bread’, for mixing, aerating, and speeding-up your compost!