With the generous gift of my new Worm Factory 360 from Nature’s Footprint sitting front and center in my living room, I was anxious as I could be to get started and the wait for red wiggler worms was almost unbearable. I’m a do it now kinda guy and I read the manual so many times while I waited to get started that I could almost recite it like I do with scenes from my favorite movies. It was worth the wait though, as I triumphantly walked into the kitchen armed with the tiny compost makers that are going to be my new BFFs, at least for the next few months while I give the Worm Factory a thorough test drive.
With the base and worm ladder piece in place, all I had to do was place a sheet of newspaper on the bottom of the first tray, presumably to keep everything in that tray from falling through to the base. The pile of stuff in the corner is bedding material that was provided in the kit that comes with the package. It is a mixture of coir and shredded paper mixed with water.
I spread the bedding evenly in the tray and following the instructions on the included DVD, added a small handful of compost material (in this case, carrot shavings) into two opposite corners.
One of the points that I have seen reiterated several times in the documentation that comes with the Worm Factory is that the smaller the food, the easier it will be for the worms to eat it and since I want them to eat, these carrot shavings seemed like a perfect Welcome Home! meal.
This photo above is the first tray fully set up, with worms in place. I added the worms to the center of the tray and not directly on the food as I was instructed. They moved to get out of the light fast!
Here you see the finished setup. To keep things moist I added a couple of sheets of moistened newspaper before putting the lid on and putting my worms to bed.
It felt kinda like I was tucking them in, even though I knew they were going to be eating all night long.
Because curiosity got the better of me, I peeked in just before going to bed myself last night and sure enough, the worms had already made their way to both piles of carrots and were happily feasting away.
