The water is your problem. Your bin needs to be able to drain. Yes, cut holes in the bottom.

A bin the size of yours can support several thousand worms, depending on how well air can get to the bottom of the compost. You would do better to start with at least 1000 worms. If you are very patient, and don't add any food to your bin, the worms you already have will eventually fill it, but that could take a year or longer. If you buy a pound of worms, you could have a thriving bin in 3 to 6 months.

Yes, holes in the bottom will help.
The way your bin is at the present time, nature will make it worse without your intervention.

IMHO, using a round 32 gal. trash can just with holes in the lid will not work too well because there is no air circulation. People using these trash cans for vermicomposting convert it into a flowthrough
http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/verm/msg042040421641.html
http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/verm/msg0914590714282.html

Are the 100 worms from your regular composter? If yes, the worms should be OK in that habitat.
If you filled the bin 3/4 with compost, what else did you put in there to cause so much stagnent water. I would say that is a lot of compost/bedding for 100 worms and make it difficult to meet one another to mate.
The mantra is: worms will process 1/2 their weight of food per day UNDER IDEAL condition.

BTW, you will have to add shredded newspaper/cardboard as part of their bedding. It also helps to absorb extra moisture. And put lots of them on top of everything to absorb/keep the smell in and flies etc. out.

To minimize the fruitflies in my bin, I prefreeze the food. That is for the indoors bin.
The outdoor bin get the food as is. This is a flowthrough and I have about 10-12" shredded newspaper on top trying to keep the flying critters in.

The ventilation holes should not be in the lid. The lid should keep water out. (Or in if the weather gets too dry.) The ventilation holes should be around the perimeter of the top edge of the garbage can.

As for shredded cardboard, yes, it will absorb moisture, but if the bin is full of compost, adding shredded cardboard will push the C:N ratio too far in the C direction. Since compost is an almost perfect bedding and food by itself, I would be inclined to drain the water, hope the worms haven't drowned, and let the bin dry out a bit, rather than mix in cardboard.

The biggest problem with using a garbage can as a worm composter is the depth. As otis11 points out, that makes it difficult to get air through all of the compost. The standing water in the bin makes the problem much worse.

The bin is full of kitchen scraps and dirt compost grass some newspaper. Did not know that i should use that much newspaper! I guess I'm still in the compost frame of mind and not vermicomposting thank you for all the help. I love the flow throu system really dont have the resources or cash flow for such systems. Definetley going to put holes in the bottom though. Just was concerned about the loss of worms back to the earth? oh well

If the bin is full of kitchen scraps and grass, then go for the cardboard. And lots of it. If you have too much grass and kitchen scraps, the bin will stink even without the rain water.

But be aware that unlike conventional composting, you DON'T want the bin to heat up!

3/4 full is too deep, especially since you only have 100 worms.

Otis

If you prefreeze the food do you put it in the bin frozen or do you thaw it first? That probably is a stupid question but I'm serious.

Dave Nelson

wow! Definately excited about starting this. I am gonna start mine next month.

Going back to c_breer's bin...

I think c_breer is trying to do too much too soon with too few worms. The first time I tried to grow worms, I did the same thing, except I did it with 5 lb of worms. They all died.

It would be better to start small until c_breer gets a good feel for how to raise worms. By then the worms will have multiplied, and c_breer can expand. 100 worms can be raised in a 5 gallon container. It won't be long before they can be moved to a 14 gallon tote, and not long after that that they can be moved into the garbage can.

I thaw them first, drain the liquid, leave the ziplock sit for a few days (if I'm patient enough to let it start to rot).
In summer when I need to cool the bin, I wrapped the bag in several layers of newspaper so the worms won't stick to it and freeze to death.
(I used frozen water bottles when it's not feeding time)

Too much food, too few worms, poor ventilation and drainage = dead worms. Sbryce and otis are right on with their advice. I would add that you need to have the can in total shade. A 32 gal can would heat up VERY quickly in direct sun. I would set some cardboard down in a shady spot, drill those holes in the bottom of the can and set it on the cardboard. If the worms leave it is a good thing! They would be escaping a toxic environment to survive, and hopefully return when things are better. Good Luck!!

Pete

"I have composted the regular way for many years." Maybe start by trying to attract worms to your outdoor compost. Then grab them for your indoor bin. Grab up the food they are in and add cardboard. Maybe dump your present bin into a compost heap unless you purchased worms and know they are still alive. All the advice posters have given is excellent. You might want to start reading back and back in the posts. That is how all the best posters learned what it is they are talking about along with their own experiments and watching their worms closely. You can learn from our mistakes. And don't worry... we will keep making them so you'all can keep on learning. :-)

hunted down about 500 worms last wednesday and add them about 20 to 30 of them died. Am about to purchase second 32 gallon trash can to split the compost and possibly purchase a mass amount of worms for both we'll see what happens

Hold-up! DonÂt buy another barrel and the last thing you need to do is buy worms! Start over and reread the advice given to you. Only the government can afford to throw money at problems. If you do it, you will lose money and have 2 stinky barrels with lots of dead worms. Dadsamit!

I have 4 "traditional" compost piles. They were built last November with much aged horse manure, UCG and straw. After they heated up for a month or so I quit turning, and it has since rained about 4'. My cold compost piles are teaming with natural red wigglers, and I add more every week. I now keep my compost bins (wire cage type) covered in burlap and straw. I also have a successful open bottom outdoor worm bin.
I agree with steamyb, dadsammit.

Throwing worms into an unhappy situation will not fix it but will put the new worms at risk.

I cut holes in the bottom and the bin is draining out well. The worms in the bin are huge one of them is about 8 inches long. I went looking in my bin and there is still alot of worms. I know I didn't start off very good but the bin is working. I am going to no longer add to the bin except for newspaper. The second bin was to start over with the right process with lots of newspaper and some food from the first bin.

c breer: I tried to find any mention what kind of worms you have, but couldn't find it.
If your worms get to 8" long, they couldn't be red wigglers. How fat are they?
Maybe that is why they died in stagnant water since they are not surface worms?
""hunted down about 500 worms last wednesday"". Where? Did you have to dig deep for them?

My grandma's farm she had a bunch of boards sitting on different stops of her farm trying to kill crabgrass for future planting beds. They were on the surface underneith the planks.

Good job on the holes breer. You may not have "red wigglers" as they seldom stretch to 8", and if they did they would be VERY slim at that moment. You may have some sort of nightcrawlers. As long as they stay put and thrive, you should be OK. Happy composting!
Pete

probably a nightcrawler but its starting to work. Im going to find more and start a small tote with a lot of newspaper and food to increase worms to add to the large composter or if the large composter doesnt work start small and work my way up!

If I were a worm, slogging through backyard clay, hunting for food and dodging birds all day, and I woke up one night to find I was in a dark field with all the food I could eat and no birds, I'd probably think I'd died and gone to heaven.

If worms have theology, that is.

that is very true

If I were c breer's grandmother, I'd wonder why I let all those wonderful worms leave my garden.

Yea she has quite a bit of acrage so she doesn't really mind