Welcome foxtailskies, Worms like the moisture in the condensation on the top and sides of the bin. If it is only a few worms don't worry too much. It will take a few days for the carrot tops to break down enough for the worms to start eating them. And the carrot itself may not break down for quite a while. Any root type plant will think you are planting it and try to grow. To make food more 'worm ready' you can freeze it first. Then thaw and feed. Freezing breaks down the cell walls and allows the microbes into the cells more quickly. It is the micro organisms the worms are going for. For a far better explanation on how that works see the very recent post "Red 'wigglers?'". lkittle did a wonderful job explaining it all 2/3 of the way down the posts. 55F is too cool for the worms. The microbes slow down and the worms pretty much stop eating at that temperature. Room temps are more comfortable for them. Even mid 60's would be an improvement. Here is a link that might be useful: Red 'Wigglers?'

Shellac does have a alcohol smell but does dissapate quickly (once dry), unlike paint that can linger for days or weeks. I used shellac based primer to seal in the smokey smell of my new house, as the previous owners were heavy smokers. It worked great, as with all paints you need to have a well ventilated area when applying.

Nappy... your guess of about 600 (euro per pound) is probably close however that is not too many for a 13 gal container. I started with two 27 gallon bins, about 2/3 filled and put about 3000 (red wigglers/euros mixed) in one bin and 5000 in the other. That was no where near high density. In the first four months the numbers way more than quadrupled without issues and last month when I added two more bins and split the populations the density was WAY more than what I'd started with in the original bins but know this, I did supply prodigious amounts of food continuously, and a generous part of it were powdered grains and other high protein items in addition to fruit and vegetable pulp. Before I ever introduced any worms into the original bins, I'd had the bins prepared already with the bedding of coir/peat and added soil/leaf compost and buried 10 pounds of juiced pulp under the bedding for about 3 weeks to get the microbe population started and so when the worms arrived in the mail I just dumped them into the bins and they had an immediately available food source from day one... and plenty of it. Within 2 days I found many of them burrowing through the middle of that pulp pile so I assume they were eating... it soon turned into a huge mass before the week was up. Your worms may be wandering out of the bin due to lack of a sufficiently ready food source. Yes, try to get some leaf litter in there or open a can of pure pumpkin or creamed corn or cooked spinach (packed without salt) and put it under the bedding and see what happens over the next few days.... you'll need to wait until a mass of worms begin mobbing it before turning the light off... in any case continue to keep the lid off the bin. Somehow I missed it that you've only had this worm bin set up for 2 days! (which should make it 5 days by now)... Worm bins are an ecosystem that will take time to develop so be patient and give it a week for the worms to settle in. Remember their whole environment was just radically changed and so it will take a few days for them to adjust.... just adjusting to the pH of the bin could take a few days...

One of my biggest Meyer growers fertilizes all his trees (in ground, of course) with a tea made from worm castings distributed through a drip irrigation system. I put worm castings on all my garden roses and citrus a couple of times per year, just as a bonus; when I create my container soil I also include worm castings. Worm castings and worm casting tea are excellent for citrus; but you have to put quite a lot; same with cow manure... excellent; but you have to put a lot.