How to Build a Night Crawler Worm Farm
You can build a worm farm for night crawlers out of about $15 worth of materials, or even salvage the needed components. You'll need to follow some straightforward techniques for drilling plastic. European night crawlers (Eisenia hortensis), like their smaller cousins, the red wigglers or Eisenia fetida, flourish in a farm that offers them a dark, moist, shallow home like the leaf litter and manure piles they populate in the wild.
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Things You'll Need
- Rubbermaid 10- or 14-gallon lidded tote
- Drill
- 2-inch hole saw drill attachment
- 2-inch soffit or wall vents (bag of 6)
- ¼-inch drill bits
- Wood scraps
- Tray
- Bedding material
- Spray bottle
- Food scraps
Instructions
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Construction
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1
Drill 2-inch holes in the sides of the tote about 3 inches from the top. Place one in each short side and two in each long side.
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2
Press the soffit vents into the holes. Friction will hold them in place.
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3
Drill about 20 evenly spaced ¼-inch holes in the bottom of the tote for drainage.
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4
Install the worm farm in its permanent location, ideally in a spot that is relatively dark and away from vibrating motors such as refrigerators or washers.
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5
Elevate the bin on wood scraps and place a tray below it to capture leachate (water that percolates through the bedding) from the farm.
Loading the Bin
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6
Add bedding of soaked cardboard torn into strips, newspaper, cardboard egg cartons, or shredded junk mail and junk envelopes (first removing the clear plastic window). Build up the bedding until it fills half or more of the tote.
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7
Spray bedding with dechlorinated water (left overnight in an open-mouthed jar) until the moisture level reaches 70 to 80 percent, as measured by squeezing it and observing one or two drops of water escaping.
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8
Add 1 or 2 cups of food scraps and allow to ripen for one week to provide fungi and bacteria for your European night crawlers in advance of their arrival.
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9
Place the European night crawlers on their bedding and spray them with water after removing them from their muslin shipping bag. They will appear quite dried out but tend to revive quickly.
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1
Tips & Warnings
Put in your worm bin only European night crawlers, Eisenia hortensis, purchased from a worm dealer (some dealers call them "super reds"). Regular night crawlers (Lumbricus terrestris), also called dew worms or common earthworms, gathered in the wild will try frantically to escape a shallow worm bin, since they live by constructing deep tunnels.
Use the same type of farm or bin and bedding for European night crawlers as the more commonly used red wiggler compost worm. Commercial worm breeders note that European night crawlers do not differ in their requirements, so you can alternatively provide them with a DIY wooden or commercially-purchased worm farm.
Keep dairy and meat products, as well as citrus rinds, out of your worm bin to avoid putrefaction and excessive acid conditions.
Wash banana peels to remove pesticides before adding to the worm farm.
Keep chemically treated paper, such as credit card receipts and thermal fax paper, out of the worm farm.
