Thanks for the tip on using a mixture of sand and peat with compost. I usually dilute the compost with water by about 2/3 and pour that water-compost mixture on the mulching around different plants. Don’t think I killed anything yet. Some of the compost goes into the garden at the end of the growing season – worms and all!

My worm bin has the tight-fitting lid that came with the plastic box, so my escapees are few. A large section of the lid is cut out and a piece of plastic mesh mesh is glued over the hole so they can get air. Also the plastic tub itself has small holes poked near the top to give more air.

To keep the worms happy and alive, they need to be kept moist and must be provided with air. So, definitely don’t use a lid without air holes!

Instead, fold up a thick newspaper so that it fits the bin, and staple the folded-up edges so that the paper won’t disintegrate all that fast. Use that as your bin lid; your worms won’t all end up either right underneath the lid, waiting to get out, or dried up on the floor, cos they did in fact manage to escape.

Using worm compost: only a few plants (potatoes, sweet peppers, pumpkins) can take straight-out compost. All the others want their compost diluted: 1/3 compost, 1/3 sand, 1/3 peat or similar.
If you give straight-out compost to most plants, they’ll just die.