Chez worms has gone upmarket

I made my first worm farm in August, 2013, and it grew to a two story condo!  All was going well in the condo until all the rain we recently had in Sydney.  The polystyrene almost disintegrated!  The worms were wet and all was not well.  Coincidentally the local council sent me a notice about a 1/2 price worm farm - I was in!  It cost me around $35 delivered, is made of sturdy plastic and the worms love it.



Here is the BEFORE photo:

Before.

The old polystyrene farm served its purpose, and did a great job!  Along the way it had a few renovations from time to time, and if the 1/2 price offer had not been there, I would simply had built a new polystyrene version.  There were a few problems with the move, the worm castings were very wet and so a bit difficult to get out of the polystyrene.  I have put the old boxes onto the garden beds to dry out, and will simply scrape the left over castings (which may have worm eggs in them) into the garden.  The other problem was vinegar flies, tiny little critters flying about the food.  For this you just add a little lime and they go away in a day.

So here is the AFTER photo:

 

AFTER

 Worms can have a problem with moving home, so here is what I did:

1. I put a sheet of drain cloth between the last worms and the fluid tray, just to make sure the worms did not drown as they will move about at first.
2. I added lime to the food to discourage the vinegar flies.
3. I put down some shredded paper in the worm trays before adding the worms 7 castings, worms love shredded paper and this should make them happier.
4. I made sure the whole lot was as a very slight angle ( I mean less than an inch!)  to ensure the worm juice did not go the wrong way.

Just one more thing: here is the link to the best worm farm fact sheet I have found : ABC GARDENING SHOW

So, hopefully our worms will stay in this condo for a few more years.