Worm Farm - DO it.television

Do you want to create the best fertiliser for your garden, in your garden? It's cheap, easy to do and better than money can buy, and it's brought to you by Mother Nature.

Worm farms are a great way to turn your leftover kitchen scraps into a rich fertiliser, and can even be placed in a small backyard or on a balcony. Worm farm boxes can be bought from gardening and hardware stores and start at $90. The farm needs to be kept in a shady and cool place with temperature between 18-25 degrees.

To give the worms a comfortable, dark home use a combination of shredded paper and coconut fibre, leaves and compost as a bedding layer. You can purchase your worms from nurseries or hardware stores and some councils have worms for sale at a reduced price, check out www.yellowpages.com.au.

After a couple of days start adding small amounts of kitchen scraps. Cover with hession and damp down – worms need to be kept moist. Add any food scraps to the farm except citrus peels, onions or meat scraps. Once they get going your worms will start producing a rich, soil-like substance called "castings", or "vermicompost", which makes a great fertiliser.

To harvest the castings, simply push it to one side and place a couple of handfuls of scraps on the other side. Those greedy little worms will quickly make their way across to the fresh food, leaving the castings safe to harvest without harming the worms.

If it gets a bit smelly just add some dry materials such as paper. And acidity can be a problem too. This is caused by too much sugary food like fruit and grain. Sprinkle lime on the farm to help solve this problem.

For an even easier farm, take a 600 mm length of 250mm PVC pipe and drill some generous sized holes in the side. Pick a spot in the veggie garden or rose bushes and dig a hole to take the entire length of the pipe. The worms will use the holes to come and go, turning your scraps into fertiliser that your plants will access. Put a lid on it to keep out pests and fill it with some compost and small amount of veggie scraps to get it started. You'll soon be amazed at the transformation of your plants.

So whichever way you go for, a worm farm produces easy, inexpensive fertiliser to give you healthy vibrant plants.

*PAST SHOWS