Low Impact

I live in a townhouse – environmentally speaking, that has its benefits. With no garden or yard, I use a lot less water than the average house. But when it comes to disposing of kitchen scraps, it gets a bit trickier – I’ve got no room for a compost heap.

If you can avoid throwing your vegie scraps in the bin, its a good thing. Scraps thrown in the bin end up in landfill, beneath piles of other rubbish, and so rot anaerobically…which is a big way of saying “without oxygen”. The end result is that they release methane gas which is an order of magnitude worse than CO2 at causing global warming.

One alternative, which is particularly suitable for apartment dwellers is a worm farm – a worm farm is exactly what it sounds like – a collection of worms who dine out on your vegetable scraps. The commercial ones are very convenient – they cost around $50 – $100 and consist of a number of stackable containers. You start off with an initial population of worms and some sort of bedding material, then just add your scraps. As you add more and more scraps, you keep adding containers to the top. By the time you’ve used all the containers, you can empty out the bottom one. This will be full of “castings” – it looks like soil and is packed with nutrients that plants love. This empty container goes on the top, and you’re off and running again!

(Of course, rather than fork out the cash to buy one, you can build your own – the concept is pretty straightforward!)

A fringe benefit of worm farms is that they regularly produce a liquid fertiliser – liquid tends to percolate down through the containers and, in a commercially-bought system, be poured out by means of a simple tap. This needs to be diluted with water (recommendations range from 2:1 to 10:1 – its strong stuff!), and can then be added to your plants. For the apartment dweller who has pot plants instead of a garden, this source of fertiliser is a big plus.

So, old scraps go in, and get recycled into plant fertiliser in the form of castings and liquid fertiliser. Plus, you’re preventing the release of methane into the atmosphere. Not bad, huh!

You’re typical worm farm is not big, and can be kept pretty much anywhere thats not in full sun – garages and balconies are ideal if you live in a unit, if you have a house, you’ll be spoiled for space and locations . A well run worm farm will not smell bad. At most, it should smell a bit like the rainforest floor – that kind of damp earthy smell.

So, how do you “run a worm farm well”? It comes down to what you feed your worms, and how much you feed them. Basically, any organic matter is good, except:

• meat
• dairy
• onions
• citrus

Meat and dairy can attract vermin and be a hygiene issue. Onions and citrus are very acidic, which worms don’t like. Apart from this, the skies the limit – old lettuce, coffee grounds, old teabags – even hair from your hairbrush!

In terms of quantity, you don’t want to overload the worms – if there’s more than they can reasonably get through, it will start to rot, and smell. One rule of thumb is to cover no more than 1/2 to 2/3 of the top of the worm farm with scraps. As your worm farm grows, and the number of worms increase, you will be able to add more and more scraps.

You can find commerical worm farms and starter tubs of 500-1000 worms at your local hardware store. The Net is also full of useful resources on how to set up a worm farm – the follow links are a good start:

• The NSW EPA page on worm farming
• Sustainability Victoria’s page on building your own worm farm
• Gardening Australia’s fact sheet on worm farming

Categories: environment, green, recycle, reduce

Tags: compost, worm farm