Hi Nate, I checked with Zach at Arizona Worm Farm about your question, and here are his responses: First Question: “Absolutely. Three basic steps: (1) remove any grass or weeds (2) loosen up the existing soil (we recommend use of a broadfork instead of tilling, but at this stage it really doesn’t matter). (3) add organic matter (compost or “green manure” like buckwheat). Then add an in-bed worm bin and plant easy stuff. Remember, making soil great takes two or three years – the first garden won’t be as good as the fourth – so they should grow squash and radishes and cherry tomatoes to start.” Second Question: “This is slightly more complicated. Our worms are a class of worms called “epigeic” they operate in the top four to six inches of the soil. To property feed trees and larger plants, nature calls on other classes of worms (and water) to carry Red Wiggler poop deeper. If you got conditions right to support our worms, you would almost certainly get deeper burrowing worms (assuming they are in the Phoenix metro area). There is certainly no harm – they just won’t necessarily get the same level of benefits as they would in a garden. To do it, just dig out a hole twice the size of the basket, put in the basket and then fill back loose native soil back to edge of the basket. Then feed it like on in this blogpost. This will work best with a layer of compost over the area they want to feed covered with mulch.”

Hi Nate, I checked with Zach at Arizona Worm Farm about your question, and here is his response: “This mix is ideal – the worms love it. For clarity: worms will eat almost all the stuff on the do not feed list – but, they don’t have teeth – so we tell people not to feed them meat and cheese and bones because all of those will smell and attract rats before they break down enough for the worms to eat. Mill is accelerating the decomposition process – so the output is great for worms.”

Can vermicomposting help amend Arizona soil for starting a garden as opposed to doing container gardening or raised bed? If so, what would be the process?

Can vermicomposting help with the soil around my trees and shrubs and how would I go about improving that soil to feed those plants and trees?

No. That is an excellent method and can work well too.

If you don’t already have them I haven’t seen that it attracts them. I get rats occasionally and they have never bothered the bins.

Yes.