It sounds like you're off to a good start...

I have a Worm Factory also, but mine's a different brand. "Adding enough food to fill up the 1st tray and half of the 2nd" is a bit ambiguous. In the beginning, you're going to be tempted to throw in as many scraps as you're producing. Don't do it! Just put in maybe 1/2 cup to get your wormies started. Too much food in there will cause tons of problems. If you've read a lot of the postings on this forum, I'm sure you'll notice the trend.

Mine's been going successfully for 2 1/2 months, and in the beginning I put in way too much food, which caused the bin to be too wet, which caused an infestation of mites. Because your bin, like mine, is plastic I think you'd have to work to get it too dry. So don't worry if you think your coir seems too dry. The other wet paper bedding & the food itself will keep things moist.

The directions with my bin did suggest putting a layer of newspaper on the bottom of the tray, as a one time deal when you first add the worms (I don't know why. My thinking was maybe to keep the worms from migrating into the collection tray when you first introduce them to their new home...?)

I'm not sure why you'd need to add anything to a second tray right now. It took me 5-6 weeks to fill the first tray, which is when I added the second.

You're sure to get lots of other good advice. I think that anyone who cares enough about the well-being of earthworms must care enough about others to offer help. In the meantime I hope this was clear enough to be of some help.

Have fun!

Thank you for the quick reply! So, do you think I should dump the bedding into another tray with newspaper on the bottom? A couple of damp layers? And everything won't dry out too much by the time the worms arrive (ETA unknown at this point)? One more question; should I add another 1/2 cup of food when I put the worms in? What I mixed in so far doesn't look like much!

Thank you so much!

I honestly don't know if it really matters if you should put newspaper down. Maybe someone else will be able to tell you.

If there's a lid on, I don't think it's probable the bin will dry out.

I wouldn't add any more food until you see that the worms are actively consuming what's already in there (to paraphrase from "Worms Eat My Garbage").

I didn't mix the food in with the bedding. I added it to a corner & then covered it up with bedding. Then after about 3 days I added another cup next to the original offering(but keep in mind, I was an over-feeder). Again, straight from "Worms Eat My Garbage", I add food at a different spot in the bin each time, sort of in an "S" shape. Does that make sense?

By adding food this way, I can easily check if it's being eaten. But don't worry about a shortage of food, because they will/do eat their bedding & it does take them awhile to get acclimated & to really start doing their jobs.

I only started with a pound of worms, so I imagine yours will get off to a quicker start. But still, don't add too much--it's so tempting, I know. We're a family of 4 & we eat a lot of veggies & we only eat out once a week, so we have a lot of "worm food".

Hope you get your worms soon. The company I ordered from actually sent me the worms a week before they sent my bin!

Okay, I won't add more food. I read about putting the food in each corner, in "The Worm Book." The only reason I mixed it in this first time as because the bin instructions told me to.

I ordered the worms from a different company than I ordered the bin from (to save money on shipping).

Thank you for the great advice!