It's not only shredded paper your worms will love, they will enjoy many other forms of paper too. Chuck in your paper towels, paper packaging, cardboard, toilet rolls etc.
Yes, paper towels can be added to the composting bin. Redworms are able to break down most of what is contained in a paper towel into useable fine soil for your garden or house plants.
Shredded Paper makes an excellent worm bin bedding. I prefer to use shredded newspaper but any type of shredded paper will work. Avoid the glossy section of the newspaper or the glossy junk mail.
Items you cannot compost in a worm bin:
Onions and garlic (a good rule of thumb is if it makes you smell, it makes your worm bin smell) Meat, fats, grease, bones or oils (no butter, lard, stocks, soups, etc) Plastics and plastic coated paper (like glossy magazines)
Paper and cardboard are a great cure all in the worm farm. Add equal amounts off paper or cardboard to the amount food scraps you are adding – this keeps the carbon content up and your farm light and airy.
It's not only shredded paper your worms will love, they will enjoy many other forms of paper too. Chuck in your paper towels, paper packaging, cardboard, toilet rolls etc.
Worms will eat anything that was once living, Leftover vegetable scraps, fruit and vegetable peelings. Tea leaves / bags and coffee grounds.
Banana peels are an excellent worm food.
Foods that Composting Worms Love
They will happily digest a wide variety of organic plant material into nutrient rich worm castings. I put old lettuce in there, rotten vegetables, potato peels, fruit, grass clipping, and leaves, just to name a few. They especially love the fruit.
What can I compost in a worm farm? Grains, cooked or uncooked (rice, oats, barley, wheat, etc.) The smaller the pieces, the quicker they'll break down in the compost pile. Be sure to cut cores in half and break down the pumpkin you forgot to eat.
Yes, but be mindful of the chlorine and other chemicals often present in tap water that can be harmful to your worms. If you're using tap water, it's a good idea to let it sit out for 24 hours before adding it to your bin. This will allow the chlorine to dissipate, making the water safe for your worms.
When do I add the bedding? When you start your worm bin, and at each harvest time, fill or top off the bin to about three-fourths full with damp- ened bedding. Add a few handfuls of garden soil to provide bacteria and grit to help worm digestion. Maintain a 2- to 3-inch layer of dampened bedding at all times.
Worms love an environment with a moisture content of 70% or more. Food wastes usually contain about 80 per cent water and this will be released as the worms break down the food scraps. However, it will remain in the bedding for a long time before eventually draining out, so it's important to add water as well.
Paper towels can be composted if they are free from grease, chemical residue, or heavy bacteria. Clean and unused paper towels are safe to compost, as well as paper towels used to clean surfaces, dishes, and to dry your hands.
Paper towels and other single-use products release methane as they break down, and on top of that, the packaging that they come in isn't recyclable either, creating more waste.
The good news is that you can use toilet paper rolls to feed your compost worms. Like many apartment and indoor vermicomposters, I'm guessing you want to reduce your environmental impact. Using toilet paper tubes can make storing and feeding your worms easier.
Earthworms consume coffee grounds and deposit them deep in soil. This may account for noted improvements in soil structure such as increased aggregation.
Worms love to eat coffee grounds, and that's great news for your garden. Add coffee grounds to your compost pile to help attract worms, which help speed up the process of turning food scraps into compost.
After worms are added, bedding should be kept moist but not soggy and the top 6 to 8 inches turned every 7 to 10 days to keep it loose. About every 6 to 9 months the old bedding should be replaced with properly prepared new bedding. To change bedding, remove the top 5 or 6 inches (where most of the worms are).
Eggshells provide calcium, which reduces acidity in the bin. This prevents high acid conditions that can harm your worms. Also, crushed eggshells provide grit to aid the worms' digestion. And, it is believed that eggshells help worms in the reproductive process.
Composting worms can absolutely be fed with crushed shells from eggs. You should know that compost worms will eat just about anything that's organic (all except meat, seafood, poultry, dairy, oily, or spicy stuff).
Dairy products such as milk, cheese, and yogurt should never go into a worm bin. Even non-fat varieties are bad for composting worms. Therefore, dispose of meat, bones, gristle, and dairy products in the trash.
The molds that form on most vegetables are usually OK, but the molds on some fruit and bread can be problematic. If you're in doubt, try a small amount first and see if the worms are bothered by it. If not, then it's probably OK to use it, otherwise, you should put them into your backyard bin instead.
The rolled oats, cornmeal, and alfalfa work together to plump up your worms quickly. The finer this mix is powdered, the quicker your worms will eat it up and fatten up. Moisten your worm bedding and then sprinkle it over the bedding surface.