

The nitrogen is recycled into vegetables and house plants. Some carbon dioxide is released as a waste product, but the amount is small, and it’s much less damaging than the methane that the same scraps would produce in a landfill.

Red worm composting makes it easy to turn this problem into a solution.Ī worm composting bin allows you to convert kitchen waste and shredded junk mail into a rich, odorless organic fertilizer for houseplants, vegetable container gardens, salad table trays, and balcony farms. Much of the nitrogen, a valuable fertilizer, off-gasses as ammonia and is lost. In landfills, kitchen scraps are compacted, and the carbon in them produces methane, a potent greenhouse gas that traps 26 times as much heat as carbon dioxide.

Red Worm Composting Bins Help Reduce Your Carbon FootprintĪ worm composting system gives even apartment dwellers a composting option. How a Worm Composting System Works Starting a Worm Binįeeding Your Worms Harvesting Worm Castings

I use worm castings in my container vegetable potting mixes, usually in the ratio of 10-20% by volume.Īll of my houseplants, potted vegetables and salad table trays use red worms composting to cycle nutrients. Organic soil amendments and potting mixes need the soil food web to break organic materials in the mix down into plant-usable nutrients.įresh worm castings-complete with worms and worm cocoons-are the best way to introduce this forest floor ecosystem to container gardens. They have both fast- and- slow-releasing nutrients, but their main benefit is biological.īeneficial bacteria and fungi are concentrated in the last chamber of the worm gut, and inoculate the worm castings as they pass through. Worm castings are a top-notch organic fertilizer for growing vegetables in containers.
