Worms in my kitchen

Last week I went to an Indoor Composting Workshop at the Lower East Side Ecology Center to learn about vermiculture. We spent all last summer dropping food scraps off at the LES Ecology Center stand at the Union Square Farmer's Market, and then buying finished compost from them to use in the garden, and I got fed up with giving them my food for free, and then having to buy it back as compost. So I've been pondering getting a worm bin for a while now.

The major kink in this plan is that I think worms are gross and scary and I don't want anything to do with them. There was an incident when I was in the 4th or 5th grade, in which my loving younger sister, as we walked home from the bus stop one day after a rain storm, decided to pick up some earthworms and chase me down the driveway, flinging them in my direction. I took off running away from worms that day, and I pretty much haven't looked back.

My main motivation in attending the workshop was to prove to myself that there was nothing to be afraid of. I already had a decent idea of most of the facts that were presented, since I've been contemplating this step for a long time, and had researched it extensively online and checked out Composting Inside and Out from the library not long ago. But I wanted to see how icky and wormy a worm bin really was, and whether I minded being around it, and whether I would have to touch the worms.

When the teacher came around to give us each a worm, I politely declined. I asked whether it was possible to have a worm bin without having to touch worms, and she assured me that it was. I don't believe her 100%, but I'm going with it for now. Besides, my husband thinks a worm bin would be "kind of cool," so I'm going to let him do any gross parts.

I'm hoping to be able to pick up a pound of red wiggler worms this week!

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