Sounds like an OK plan to me. I read a harvesting method once where you do what you say, then scrape off an inch at a time across a few hours, the little fellas keep moving down away from the light. When there's not much left, start feeding in your new top tray.

Cheers
Jay

If you have all 3 trays on, all your worms and food should be in the top 2 trays. That 3rd (original)tray should be virtually all compost ready to be used. Once emptied it rotates to the top, as the top working tray.

I have a three story plastic worm condo and many of the worms stay in the basement swimming pool. What am I doing wrong?

urbfarmer,

That's been my experience as well. After many months I lifted the top trays to see what was going on in the bottom reservoir and it was full of casings and worms. I don't know if they couldn't make their way back up to the top or just preferred the basement...

BettyN

Betty...I have been havesting casting in my Can O Worms using the method you described. I take the layer to be harvested and put it on top, leave the cover off and place it out in the sun. As the top layer drys the worms travel down to the next layer where its moist. This seems to work best for seperating the worms from the finishing compost/casting mix.

gatatl,

Thanks for the feedback!

BettyN