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New house, new garden and no worms !

JAYJARDINJAYJARDIN Posts: 256
in Problem solving
We recently moved home and have started renovating the garden and we have discovered that we do not have any worms ! The soil is just awful!. What on earth (excuse the pun!) can we do about this ? We are in North Devon. The soil is kind of like clay but not the sort we had in Hertfordshire, it breaks up easily but puddles with water when it rains and seems to dry out fairly quickly. Any help you can offer would be appreciated. Thanks.
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  • Mrs-B3-Southampton,-HantsMrs-B3-Southampton,-Hants Posts: 732
    The usual answer is buckets of manure.
    Southampton 
  • StephenSouthwestStephenSouthwest Posts: 635
    I'd be looking for a local free source of manure to mulch with....
  • JAYJARDINJAYJARDIN Posts: 256
    I thought so but wanted to see if there were any other solutions!
  • DovefromaboveDovefromabove Posts: 88,147
    edited May 2023
    Talk to @Hostafan1 … he’s not too far from you and he gets loads of wood chippings from a friendly tree surgeon … he composts them and mulches to improve his soil. 

    Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.





  • Jenny_AsterJenny_Aster Posts: 945
    .
    Trying to be the person my dog thinks I am! 

    Cambridgeshire/Norfolk border.
  • Jenny_AsterJenny_Aster Posts: 945
    edited May 2023
    To help populate your garden with worms, I would try the following:

    1. Dig 4 or 5, roughly 30cm diameter, 30cm deep holes in your garden where you're planning to plant something in the future.

    2. Make a roughly 10cm deep bed/layer at the bottom of the hole with hydrated coir.

    3. Buy 100g (£5) or more of composting worms from the internet (Ebay, Amazon) though I'd really recommend https://www.wigglywigglers.co.uk/collections/live-worms, they are the experts. You can also buy normal garden worms from them. Composting worms work on topsoil whereas garden worms live deeper. 

    4. Divide your worms between your several holes. Place a loose lid on top to keep the worms in the dark. 

    5. Gradually fill the holes with kitchen peelings, especially banana peel (no onion or citrus), coffee grounds, tea bags, crushed egg shells. Don't put anything in that's been dressed in oil or butter, no meat or dairy other than the egg shells. If the worms have food they'll stay, in the meantime they will feed on the coir. In my wormery I place a layer of damp cardboard on top of their food, before the lid

    6. After a few months you should have worm castings (eggs in compost), mix some of this with normal compost or mulch to spread the worms around your garden. 

    7. Eventually plant a tree or shrub in the well prepared holes, or continue breeding worms.

    If you've got 'little people' I think they'd love to help, maybe even becoming 'worm wardens'.
    Trying to be the person my dog thinks I am! 

    Cambridgeshire/Norfolk border.
  • DovefromaboveDovefromabove Posts: 88,147
    edited May 2023
    We found impoverished dry gritty ‘soil’ when we moved here … and n’er an earthworm to be seen … but a few years of adding our own garden compost and farmyard and stable manure at every opportunity, and not using ‘artificial’ fertilizer but only Fish, Blood & Bone, and chicken manure pellets and similar, and the veg patch and borders are full of fat healthy wriggling earthworms. 

    Usually the earthworms are present in most soils, but they’re much deeper down when the topsoil is not to their liking or the temperatures are too hot or cold.  Improve the topsoil and they will appear. The RHS state that there is usually no need to buy earthworms. https://www.rhs.org.uk/biodiversity/earthworms 

    Composting worms are another matter and it can be useful to buy some when starting a compost heap if you’re in a hurry  .., although they too will appear ‘as if by magic’ given enough time and the right conditions … I’ve been gardening for many years in various conditions and I’ve never found the need to buy worms for a compost heap. They have arrived of their own accord. Marvellous creatures.
      🪄 🪱

     However, if you want to start a wormery for your kitchen waste rather than adding it to your compost heap, then brandling, manure and red or tiger worms  are an essential part of ‘the kit’ .., more info and some suppliers here 

    😊 

    Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.





  • Busy-LizzieBusy-Lizzie Posts: 24,043
    I've been making a new garden over the last 2 years. There were no worms at first and the soil is clay. As I dug each bed I dug in loads of compost and some donkey manure. Most of the compost was bought as my heap hadn't yet got going. Previous owners had a donkey. Now I have worms, the soil is a better texture and drains better.
    Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.
  • Joyce GoldenlilyJoyce Goldenlily Posts: 2,933
    I also had a barren garden when I first moved here. I had impoverished, thin gritty soil which when soil tested showed virtually no nutrients.
    I have continually added homemade compost, old potting compost, and fertilizers for plants and I also now have worms.
    It takes time and patience, as all gardening does.
  • bédébédé Posts: 3,095
    If you don't already have one, start a compost heap.  Test the soil pH, worms don't like acid.  Keep adding organic matter and wait.
     location: Surrey Hills, England, ex-woodland acidic sand.
    "Have nothing in your garden that you don't know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful."
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