From a Wormer’s Eye View: Reflections on My Year of Worms

Editor's note: After we ran a story about creating indoor compost bins in our March 2010 Enews, a reader shared some insights about her own experience.
Here's her story.

By Peggy Ueda

She said it would be easy, and it was! My new neighbor had made her own kitchen worm composter where she used to live in San Francisco and offered to help me create one too. Following her and additional internet instructions, I drilled holes in a 10-gallon opaque storage container, added some “starter” compost from my outdoor bin and shredded paper and waited for my mail order worms to arrive. When they arrived we were surprised and disappointed to get only about a dozen for some $30. (I’ve since learned that you can get them for less at places such as Uncle Jim’s, which also offers a 10% discount for Conservancy friends.) Nevertheless, my few worms were so effective that my kitchen scraps virtually disappeared before my eyes, and the worms proliferated so rapidly that within a few weeks I gave some away to a person who made a request through “Freecycle”.

I read that red wrigglers should not be released to the outdoors because they rapidly devour leaf cover, which harms the environment. While their characteristic fecundity and voracity, which make them so suitable to composting, could raise such a concern, evidently it is not clear that they are an actual threat. The Brooklyn Botanic Garden (www.bbg.org) and the Sustainable and Urban Gardening (www.sustainable-gardening.com) websites have discussions of this issue. Some suggest not to release worms (or compost, which may contain worms) into forested areas.

I have had my worm composter under a bench in my kitchen for about a year now, and I have these observations to offer.

First, instructions on building composters are pretty similar but there are some differences. I ended up following advice to drill several large holes for ventilation on the sides and bottom. I glue-gunned netting from a Clementine box over them. I rested the container on bottle caps on top of a lid from another, larger storage container (with a rim to hold in any drainage). I think drilling many smaller holes would work just as well and avoid the extra step of covering with netting (not sure if that’s even necessary). With respect to having holes in the bottom, there are advantages and disadvantages. My compost tends to stay very moist as I mainly add kitchen scraps and teabags. I should add leaves or shredded paper more often but I’m lazy. With the holes at the bottom, the compost drains, giving me a “compost tea” that I add to my watering can as fertilizer for my indoor plants. Without bottom drainage, one needs to be more attentive to not letting the compost get too wet. On the other hand, one may prefer the tidiness of having a self-contained unit without a tray underneath and not having to pour off the drainage.

Second, we rapidly developed a fruit fly infestation. I followed a tip to freeze produce such as banana peels before adding to the composter and this seems to have eliminated the problem.

Third, as promised in many places, there has been no odor at all with the composter, even when I open it up to turn the compost periodically. Its convenience for disposing of organic material in an environmentally beneficial way without my having to trudge across snow and ice to the outdoor composter in the winter cannot be beat!