Red Worm Colony

[Brewster320]

I was interested if anyone else has a colony of Red Wigglers? I keep these guys and use them as treats for my cichlids, my snapping turtle, and as bait for fishing. These guys are basically earth worms but they are smaller than their night crawler relatives and much more heat tolerant. Where night crawlers must stay cold to survive these guys are comfortable at room temp and warmer.

I saw people doing this online a lot as its become popular with the green movement and all so I decided to try this and have actually found this to be really simple, inexpensive, eco-friendly, and convenient.

I started with just 3 dozen I bought at a bait shop probably 6 months ago. I now literally have hundreds of them. You can buy hundreds online to start but I wanted to just try this out on a small scale. Once they are established they breed faster than any feeders I've tried raising myself. You with find little orange-yellow spheres in the soil, these are their eggs and hundreds babies hatch from these.

The set up is very simple. I have two 30 gallon Rubbermaid bins with one inside the other and a lid on the top one with air holes. The top one has holes on the bottom to allow drainage so the worm's set up does not become water logged and the bottom one just collects the drainage. I then put a layer of weed guard so the worms don't go through the holes. Then you put down a layer of shredded cardboard, then lettuce or other leafy green, and then Eco-earth and let it sit for a week. You then add the worms and let them become established before really adding to much to it. Once established all you really need to do is add food once or a couple times a week, stir up the soil once in awhile, empty the drainage from the bottom bucket(use it to water plants for something), and just leave them alone.

You might expect that is would smell but if properly kept there is little to no oder from it even though it's basically compost. I keep mine in my bed room and you would not know it was there unless I showed you it. Mine now I use like a garbage bin and just toss stuff in there and it will decompose and get eaten by the worms. The only recommendations I would make is to avoid meats as they smell and if your setup is outside it will attack unwanted visitors and bury any fruits and veggies as it will keep fruit flies from taking breeding. Other than that I put in there expired fruits and veggies, clipping from my planted fish tanks, grass clipping after mowing the lawn, leaves, egg shells, paper, cardboard, junk mail, ect. I even toss in stuff when I spot clean my snake rack including sheds, feces, and old aspen. If its organic the worms will eat it!

After awhile you will have to clean out the bin. There are a couple ways of doing that so you don't lose all your worms but I have yet to reach that obstacle. Once you do though, the by product is some of the most prized fertilizer in the world. You could use it for your own uses or sell it as there is a market for it. Once you clean it out and have your worms separated you just start the process all over again.

After paying for the setup it is very inexpensive to take care off since everything you put in to feed them is stuff you would have probably thrown out anyways. And along with fertilizer you also have bait for fishing and feeders that are great for fish, amphibians, garter snakes, turtles, insectivorous lizards, and whatever else would eat invertebrates.

I hope this helps out some people as I don't see this as popular in the reptile community and some people who would be interested in this wouldn't have the chance to get exposed to this.

Here's some pictures of my setup. Enjoy!

[danrjc]

Thanks for this write up. I bought 50 from the bait shop and have been giving these to my asfs, they go crazy for them plus they are growing faster.