Worm Farm
30-60 min
Ages 8+
What Will You Make?
We are going to create a worm farm to learn more about their form of nutrition, relationship with the environment.
What Will You Learn?
Compare the diversity of forms of nutrition, relationship with the environment and identify that they are the result of evolution.
Grab your materials...let's get started!
Step 1
Take your plastic bottle and cut off the top.
Step 2
To create our worm farm we are going to add different levels: first we place the earth, then the sand and repeat; we also add a little water to create humidity.
Add worms and worm food
Step 3
Once the jar is full, then add your worms to the top of the jar.
Step 4
Add the compost, these are the vegetable waste; this is the food for the worms.
Decorate your worm home
Step 5
Wrap your bottle with the black sheet of paper, as Sunlight can kill worms because they are sensitive to ultraviolet radiation.
Now cover your bottle with cotton cloth and a rubber band.
Step 6
During the next few weeks water your worm farm with a spray bottle, and continue to check the jar of worms, you can use your biology notebook to make predictions and observations about the activities of the worms.
As we check the worms over the weeks we will see that gradually the layers of soil have combined.
Finished project sample
What Is Happening Here?
soil aeration, vermiculture compost
The worms are essential for the soil, they are like a mini machinery that turns the soil and breaks it. Tunneling as they move, they break up large sections of the soil, as well as oxygenate, transport nutrients and minerals. They also feed on bacteria and fungi from food scraps.
What Is Next?
Can worms slow climate change?
“David Johnson of New Mexico State University thinks they can. The recipe, he says, is to tip the soil’s fungal-to-bacterial ratio strongly toward the fungi.” – from Scientific American article, Can Soil Microbes Slow Climate Change.
Now it’s your turn, brainstorm how we can help conserve our soils.
And then try one of these projects…
About MoonMakers
MoonMakers — led by Camila and Diego Luna — are a community of creators passionate about knowledge. A Makerspace, an open space with different digital manufacturing machines. And a YouTube channel where we promote science, technology and the maker movement.
MoonMakers have collaborated with companies such as: Sesame Street, Make Community and in Mexico with Educational Television and Fundación Televisa, creating educational content.
We have given workshops throughout the Mexican Republic with: Talent Land, Secretary of Education in Jalisco, Conacyt, Centro Cultural España.
Materials:
- pet bottle
- Scissors
- Land
- Sand
- earthworms
- Sheet of black paper
- Cotton fabric (thin)
- League
- Headband
- compost
