I'm thinking about buying 1000 and setting up a bin in a plastic tote. Anybody ever raised any?

Thought about it myself and turning it into a business. Do plenty of research. Make friends with a few horse farms or someone with a few horses. Warms love it. Second best is cow manure. Chicken is to hot. Also stock up on cardboard and paper. Very easy to get turned into a full time job. The worm poo can be bagged and sold as well, organic gardners love it.

just make sure you either drill holes in that tote lid or do not put it on tight or the worms mutiny and you have them all over the place. the kids thought hey were helping by putting the lid on.

you want a tray under your tote , I found the concrete mixing tub sold at home depot under a rubber made tote worked well , drill drain holes in the tote bottom and vent holes in the lid

a pound of worms turns into 10 in about 6 months .

vegetable scraps and coffee grounds covered by a section of damp news paper to block the light and keep the humidity.

when your food scraps get the bin full to the top start dividing to more bins or giving , using or selling worms.

I have seen some stack-able worm bins think 1/4 inch hardware cloth and boxes as you get a layer full the next one on top is filled and they just keep working their way up into the new feed and abandon the lower level like this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9lO7emUKk0

if you have a large space that doesn't freeze up like in a green house I have seen them done in even larger bins , same concept as the stacking bin but sideways each bin about the size of a pallet they were using pallets for dividers .

this is what the place I bought my pound of worms , the don't really measure just give you an ice cream bucket of compost and worms and guarantee they are dense enough you should have at least a pound in the bucket.

they kept them going like this and also had compost piles all over around their other green houses that also kept hot enough that the worms lived but should if freeze up very hard they had this store of worms in the green house with heat as backup.

most big active compost piles keep from freezing up in the winter , the small home piles generally freeze in cold places.


technically red worms are an invasive species , there are a few places they have not spread since arriving in balast soil that was off loaded but have likely been in the US for 300 years .

the chequamegon national forest is one of these places.

Interesting thread

What I have been told are red Wiggler's around here are almost impossible to put on a hook. Dang things spit juice all over ya when a hook is poked thru an are strong enough to break off when they fight the hook. Also they seem to kill off any other kind of worms in the same bucket with their slime. I'm a sod worm fan

agreed

I tried the worm business, but had no real teachers. I had big wooden boxes and in a rainy spell most of them crawled out and went into business on their own. That was about 60 yrs ago and today any earth worms around my place are very red and wiggly.

Then there was the ant farm for my 7th grade science project. Found an ant hill and robbed the eggs and put them in 1/2 gal jars made in WW2. Put them in under a table we kept the water bucket and wash pan on in part of the kitchen. I had given up them hatching and left the lids off. They hatched out and was all over the kitchen. Never heard my mom yell so loud, lol.

People do make a living at raising worms. 20 or so years ago there was a guy about 5 miles from here sold worms all over for several years. Don't know how much he made but did it quite a spell, so must have been making something.

A buddies dad raises them in an old chest freezer. Keeps the bedding covered with damp newspaper then a thin piece of plywood over that. Props the lid open for air to circulate. Keeps them fed. Usually 2 scoops with a 3 prong flower bed rake into a bucket and you have more than enough for a full day on the water.

Interesting.

Let me ask. I've got a place where there are almost no worms. It's good soil, along the river bottom. Just say a feller would like to get those red wigglers started, what would be the best way?

Was thinking I could till up a little spot, water it down good and "plant" maybe 10 dozen worms. Just get the soil loose so they could get underground and all. What could you do to help them out? What kind of food?

Years ago that spot was the family garden, nobody is using it now.

You might want to try a leaf mulch. When I was a kid (60 years ago) there was no composting. The City had a spot where they dumped the leaves that people put on the curb every Fall. We would get all the red worms you could ever use by just lifting up some of the leaves. There were gazillions of them.

Redsnow, I would think long and hard before helping propagate a non-native species. Maybe those worms you want to plant are in fact native, then by all means, full steam ahead. But do a little research on the effects of earthworms on their environment before you get to dumping. Just some (worm)food for thought.

Red wigglers, the Cadillac of worms!

Well, my daughter ordered a package deal of red wigglers, should be here tomorrow. I'm going to the river now and get us some rotten leaves and dirt. What else do we need? Or need to know?

I think she's getting about 20 dozen? I hope they're not cooked during shipping!

Heres a picture of how my buddies dad handles the top of the bedding in his chest freezer worn bed. I raised the lid higher than it normally sits to get the picture. Between the plywood and bedding I believe he puts damp newspaper.

Thanks for posting the picture. We got the worms yesterday, I guess they're doing ok? My daughter is messing with them, she's got them in a plastic tote. I'll guess it's about 20 gallon or so?

Found a place where we can get some horse manure, and have a friend that works at the restaurant across town, she's to start saving coffee grounds. Read where the worms will eat the filters and all, so it won't be much hassle.

Going to try to get another tote set up and ready, we'll wait a month or so and transfer some of the worms into it, and let them do their thing. Seems like our biggest problem now might be the hot weather? Sitting on the ground, pretty much and in the shade. We'll see what happens.

Angela Hawkins in Ohio raises them in her rabbit barns by the tens of thousands.

I did for awhile until they got a mite on them and died. Did watch a video of a guy that sold the worm juice to people to pour around their plant. Don't forget worm castings is a very good fertilizer.

I had a worm ranch once....but they stampeded and all ran off..dang near killed me.

Got a green smelly worm lives under the blown down leaves of soft maples that grow in creek and river bottoms around here. Best bait worm I've ever used. No they are not catalpa worms. Can get them in the spring and fall when it cools down. They go deep in hot weather. I believe I have caught every species of fish native to KS on them and some species that were stocked. If a guy wanted to gather and compost soft maple leaves, keep them cool like night crawlers, I think you could corner the worm market.