Feeding food scraps to worms not only recycles waste and stops it going to landfill, but you don’t need to buy expensive equipment to do it. You can make a simple worm farm out of an old tyre and a few other bits and pieces you should find lying around your home.
Here’s what you’ll need:
Old bricks or large stones
A piece of wire netting
Newspapers
An old tyre
Two old sacks or pieces of carpet
Compost, manure or straw
Worms – buy these at garden centres or hardware stores or, if you know someone with a worm farm, they can give you a few
Wood or plastic for the lid.
Arrange the bricks or stones in a shaded place in your garden that’s warm and out of the wind. Put the wire netting over the top.
Soak the newspapers in water and stuff them inside the rim of the tyre until it is full. Leave the inner circle empty.
Place the tyre on the netting, then lay a piece of carpet or an old sack in the base.
Fill the tyre with compost, manure or straw, then tip the worms in.
Cover with a thick layer of wet newspaper then another piece of carpet or sacking. Place lid on top. This is your worm farm.
Feed the worms kitchen scraps by scattering under the top layer of newspaper (450g of worms will eat 225g of food scraps a day), and make sure to keep the farm nice and moist.
