Worm Composting Mini Course

How Do I Harvest Worm Compost? – Lesson 5

Okay, now we’re finally getting somewhere.  We’ve got a worm bin full of happy worms.  And we’ve got worm compost in the worm bin.  Now what?

You could just dump all that compost with worms in your garden as is.  But, unless you live in a select few places, your worms won’t live.

Besides, you probably want to keep the momentum going in the bin with the worms you have.

Here’s the bad news.  Up until now, the worms have been doing all the work for you.  They’ve been doing the turning and the aerating.  They’ve been driving the system by pooping out aerobic bacteria.  All you do is add food and paper.

Now you have to do some work.

Three Methods for Harvesting Worm Compost

You can use any single method or any combination of methods.  The main factor that will influence your choice is time.

To harvest worm compost you can remove worms by:

corralling the worms

screening the worms

light harvesting the worms

Corralling Composting Worms

To corral composting worms, simply start feeding one area of the bin only.  The worms will slowly start to congregate in the area.  This will take more than just a few days.  So if you’re in a hurry, don’t use this method.

In addition to feeding just one area of the bin, you can “set a trap” for your worms.  Place food in a potato bag, a citrus bag, or some other container with holes.  Bury it in the worm bin.  After a couple of days remove the container.  You’ll have a bunch of worms and food.

Don’t wait too long or the worms will consume all the food and move on.

This is a good method for removing some worms to start a new bin.

You can repeat this method as many times as necessary to remove the desired amount of worms.

Screening Composting Worms

A much faster method to separate worms from compost is to screen them out.

Cut a piece of 1/8″ hardware cloth.  It doesn’t have to be that big, just big enough to span the width of your bin.

Screen handfuls of compost through the screen and into another container.

An even better way to screen worm compost is to use a home made tumbler from the same 1/8″ hardware cloth.

The tumbling action keeps worms rolling and keeps them from falling through the screen.

I wrote a whole post about the home made worm castings harvester.

Light Harvesting Composting Worms

The final method for harvesting worms is light harvesting.  I save this for last because if you screen your worm castings and want to separate worms for sale, you’ll probably have to do this.

When you screen the castings, you’ll be left with the larger chunks and worms.  To separate the worms from the larger chunks, use light harvesting.

Congratulations!  You finished the course!  Keep watching your inbox because I’m going to send you a special gift for seeing it through to the end.