If you want the most nutrients for your garden, you seriously need to get a worm bin started. Worm castings or worm poop are second only to fish as far as nutrients go. Red wigglers are the most common, they cost about 5.00 per 100.
The way I set mine up was to get a rubbermaid bin 30x24x24 and fill it up with shredded paper as a great bed, add compost and manure, a little sand and some kitchen scraps. I started out with a 3" pile, adding more compost and manure along the way is a good idea. My bin has 300 worms and the best environment for them is keeping everything moist by pre soaking the paper and compost. Having a spray bottle near to spray down the pile as well as adding veggy and fruit scraps is a good idea also. Make sure you bury the food to prevent gnats. They say that your worms will double their numbers in a month or so. After about 3 months you can place a window screen on top of your pile, add some moist compost on top of the screen and then the worms will come up to the compost leaving the valuable worm castings behind. Starting a new bin with your saved worms should happen too. Add this to your garden or better yet mix 50/50 castings and coconut coir for a soil thats better than any!
