Did you soak the brick of coif? You should have enough to fill the first tray. If not, simply tear up and soak some more newspaper. I use a bedding mixture of peat moss, compost and leaves, but others have great success with newspaper, cardboard, leaves or the coif stuff alone...BUT don't worry about not having compost (although it's great to process), the worms will bring the biology to get things going.

By introducing the food stock and giving it time to decompose the beneficials will all grow to abundance so don't wait just put the food in. Add more newspaper for bedding but don't wet it and surround the food or mix around it and then the paper will absorb the moisture of the foodstock and inoculate it for the beneficials. You will quickly find out that the bedding can become too wet after the foodstock is added. The worms don't mind the wetter conditions, I think they actually prefer it but it doesn't make for a nice fluffy bedding if too wet and the castings end up being more like clay rather than coffey ground consistensy.

Nibblin,

Good luck with your can of worms. I too got one last year.

If you read the booklet that came with it you'll know that the coir has to be soaked for a while to make it expand and this expanded coir is what goes into tray on top of the cardboard. When your worms arrive they are placed on top of this bedding, then the next tray goes on. This is where food is placed. The worms will go up to the food. this food should be covered, I use damp burlap to cover the food. My worms have eaten up my first burlap cover. It's a good idea to have a roll of burlap near by. And to leave the tap open at all times.

I ordered 1000 worms. I really don't know what 1,000 worm looks like so I hope that is what I got. For all I know there could have only been 500.

This is a great site for finding out tons of information. Keep checking previous listings.

My COW is in my cellar, since the climate where I live is cold. I was thinking of bringing the bin upstairs where it is warmer and maybe that would spark more activity in the can -- such as reproducing -- but although my husband is very forgiving of me and my worms I have a feeling he wouldn't like worms in one of our spare rooms.

Good luck.

Mickey2

instead of compost, can i add a handfull or two of rich detritus from a swamp? to add the microbes?

i have ready access to rich, dark mud b/c of my job. would the worms like this? i'd hate to go knocking door to door for compost.

can you tell i'm obsessing before my worms even arrive??

but that's what this forum is for, right?

nibblin, you dont need to bury the food if you dont want to, you can put it on top of the coir, and cover it up with some shredded newspaper. when the worms arrive just lift up the newspaper and put them with any bedding they came with on top of the coir and put the newspaper back over the top. Ive always run my worm bin like this and it works really well.

trance

I recently found this forum and have read a lot of useful information. My problem is not writing it down and forgetting
the link to locate the information a second time. It seems the search at the bottom is no longer working either because I tried to search Kelly with no results.

So this question is for AbbeysDad...I am trying to layer my worm bin and I used shredded newsprint for the bedding. Next I put in some potting soil in which I found a couple of handfuls of red worms and a few eggs while repotting a large house plant. I put in some rotting lettuce and the worms are already eating it. I had read one of Kelly's posting about using leaves on top of the worms. Can I use damp leaves and dead/dying grass (we haven't had any rain here in central Texas in several months) as a top dressing? If so how many inches? When would I add more food for the next layer- As I started with such a few worms I am trying to follow everyones advice about not feeding too much. I will be keeping these in the house as the summer here can be very brutal. Maybe I can learn some tricks from Chuckieb as he seems to have success outside.

Thanks,

Kim

I, too, have a "new" COW. Followed set up directions and all seemed to be going really well. Last week there seemed to be much fewer worms and thought it was because it had gotton too wet. Reached down and pulled out the cardboard on the bottom, mixed it up with the bedding and added more straw and newspaper. There was a post several weeks ago about how someone set up her COW (wish I'd looked it up before I started this), but set up as she suggested and it looks like things are back on track. Just my 2 cents.

The post was New to Worm Composting and the person is "Emily_ak"!

instead of compost, can i add a handfull or two of rich detritus from a swamp? to add the microbes?

Go ahead and add a handful or two--can't hurt, and it will probably help.

Like others have said, soak your coir (if I remember correctly, one brick of coconut husk fiber will soak up 7 or 9 liters of water--hot water works fastest, but keep this away from your worms until it cools to the touch!!). This should fill up one tier of a COW, or just cover the bottom of one of those plastic 18-gal storage containers. The coir should be damp but not wet--if you can squeeze more than a few drops of water out of it, it's too wet. Dig a couple of pockets and bury some food, and let this sit for a week or two until the worms arrive. If it's too late to start early and your worms are already here, just dump them in.

When I first set up my COW, I put the coir and the food in the top bin, and filled the other two levels with dry shredded newspaper. In this way, the collection/drainage bin at the bottom of the COW doesn't get filled up with sludgy-bits, and you get nicely aged shredded newspaper that soaks up leachate and is innoculated with the fungi and bacteria in your system. Then, when you've filled up the first level, just switch up a level with only shredded newspaper (your bedding), and you don't need to worry about innoculating another level with compost or anything.

Emily in sunny Fairbanks