Worms, Cakes and Butterflies!

Tai Tokerau Timebank in Whangārei April Social - We were very lucky with a sunny morning for our autumn social this year! Not the best date as it clashed with Art Beat and the 1st Saturday of school holidays...

But we enjoyed eating cake and a worm farming demonstration from Central Whangārei Crop Swap host, Niki Taylor.

Whangārei Timebank member, Niki Taylor, is a fountain of useful information on farming compost worms and lots of useful gardening tips e.g:

1            Put slug bait in a plastic container with a hole cut in the side so the dead slugs are contained and don’t end up getting eaten by birds. Put a small rock in there too to stop the container blowing away.

2            Cut a white butterfly shape out of hard white plastic, mark with black dots using a permanent marker – mimicing the exact placing on live butterflies - glue to a stick and poke in amongst your plants. This will deter them from laying eggs (check there are no eggs in situ 1st).

Successful Worm Farming! By Niki Taylor

You only need a large Sistema container which can live inside your home. Very clean and very attractive to the worms!

Soak ½ block of coir (coconut husks)

Prepare unbleached cardboard & paper by cutting into small pieces.

Layer the coir on top of the cardboard.

Add the worms

Add chopped up food (smaller bits of food decompose faster as there are more surfaces exposed)

Encourage little white mites by putting in larger bits of food – eg watermelon. They start the decomposition process which the worms then continue with.

As compost worms are vegetarians, the tiny red mites eat any flesh eg dead worms. To remove excess red mites, put a water-soaked piece of bread into the bin overnight, the red mites will move onto it and you can then remove the bread the next day with all the mites attached!

If the worms are trying to escape from your bin – the bin is too acid. Add a handful of dolomite.

Niki sells compost worms at $25 a kg.