Our normal compost bin in the garden has holes in its base to encourage earthworms and decomposing microorganisms from the garden to move into the bin and to start the process of breaking down our garden and vegetable waste. They do an admirable job, but the problem with the compost bin is that there are so many other pieces of food waste that cannot be put in the bin; fish, meat and fat from the grill. Some people even say that you should not put cooked vegetables into these bins. This is to avoid attracting pests.

A wormery is different, like an advanced composting system. It is sealed, so that it does not attract rodents or other pests, and it comes with a special pack of tiger worms, who can breakdown meats and fish, and who can do it fast! It is possible to keep my wormery indoors and this is where I have it at the moment, in a utility room that leads from our kitchen. It will hopefully make life a lot easier in the future, as we will no longer need to traipse to the bottom of the garden with the compost in wet weather.

For the moment, however, our worms are still settling in. Setting up the wormery took approximately one hour. It involved the simple steps of putting the plastic pieces of the wormery together and preparing some worm bedding material (this involved some pre-prepared material that was sent with the worms as well as lots of shredded newspaper, some active compost from our old bin to introduce microorganisms and some food). Then we left the worms to settle.

A week in they seem to be doing a fine job and, as the colony expands, we are adding more and more food that is gradually turning into compost. An added benefit of the wormery is the thrill it gives small toddlers who come to visit. They are fascinated by the sight of the worms, although their mothers are not so happy! But, a word of warning, don’t leave small children free access to your wormery, they seem to want to put everything in their mouths….