Anyone that has ever studied vermiculture knows that there are three basic ways to kill Redworms.

1. Direct Sunlight
2. Standing Water
3. Too Much Food for the Amount of Worms in your Bin

Direct Sunlight:  Worms can tolerate a lot of heat, but worms cannot tolerate the heat from unfiltered sun. Sound strange? Let me explain.

Regardless of what you read on the Internet or in worm books, worms (In damp bedding) tolerate ambient temps over 100 degrees without any problem whatsoever!  I usually have over 100 pounds of worms residing in my garage at any given time. Our local temps exceed 100 degrees quite often in the summer. I’ve never lost a pan of worms due to ambient temperatures exceeding 100 degrees.  Why?  The bedding the worms live in keeps them insulated from the ambient temps.   Conversely,  I’ve worked outdoor events in 75-85 degree weather where I thought I had shaded my worms well, but the sun shifted, cooking my worms.  How does this happen?   If the outside of the bin gets warm to the touch, you create a frying pan situation for your worms.  As the heat transfers from your bin to the bedding, worms begin to  cook.

How do you know when worms are cooking?  You’ll smell them.  And it isn’t a pleasant smell.

Standing Water:   Redworms need moisture to live, but cannot tolerate standing water. 

Although worms need moisture in order to breathe, standing water causes redworms to rot.  It’s the reason the stackable worm bins have become so popular!  Even the most uneducated worm farmer can keep worms alive in a bin that doesn’t hold water!  The spigot in the base really isn’t for collecting the leachate (Notice I did not call this overwater”Worm Tea”….more on this later), it’s so you don’t have a bowl of standing water sitting around forever!  The stackable bins allow you plenty of room for error in the amount of water you add to your bin, without killing your worms!  Pretty cool huh!

Too Much Food for the Amount of Worms in your Bin:  This is the tough one.   

It’s pretty easy to keep the sun off of your worm bin.  It’s easy to avoid overwatering when your worm trays are loaded with holes.  But…How do you avoid overfeeding your worms?   The 15 pounds of  lettuce in the picture above was added this weekend, and will all  be eaten by next weekend.  How?  I’ve got 20 pounds of worms in the bin.  

Considering that most people buy 1-3 pounds of worms to start, it may be quite awhile before most people are actually recycling ALL of their scraps with their worms.  It’s unreasonable to try and feed a pound or two of worms 15 pounds of scraps, but you would be amazed at how many people try!      So…How much should you feed your worms at any one time?   A good rule of thumb to feed your worms no more than the weight of your worms ! 

1 pound of worms get up to 1 pound of scraps.

2 pounds of worms get up to 2 pounds of scraps.

3 pounds of worms get up to 3 pounds of scraps.

I don’t recommend a new worm person start out with more than a few pounds of  worms.  Best to learn how easy they are to keep alive first (It is easy with some good advice)!

For those of you that have been raising a pound or two of worms, and are salivating at the thought of composting a LOT more here is my recommendation. 

Go halves with a friend on a bulk purchase! On my no frills site, WWW.BulkWorms.Com, I currently have a 10 pound special on Red Wigglers…JUST $169 WITH FREE DELIVERY!

Why buy bulk?  3 pounds of worms are $59.99, plus $11 shipping = $70.99   Compare this with splitting a bulk purchase with a friend…you each pay only $84.50 for 5 full pounds of worms!

You too can be shaking your head in amazement at just how much your worms can eat!   Plus, when spring comes, you’ll have all the castings you need for the BEST garden ever!

 

  

 

I continually stress the importance of spending the time to set up your worms in proper bedding.  If the bedding is set up correctly, raising worms is easy.  If not, it’s a never ending challenge.  Michael sent some interesting questions that offered me the opportunity to remind everyone about making a proper worm bedding…..

 Good evening. Hope you are having a good week.

I have a few questions and I hope you don’t mind.

1. Does it matter, when adding bedding, if some of the newspaper strips are stuck together? After I squeeze out the water from the soaked papers they get stuck together and it is hard to separate them. Do you have any tips for preparing the bedding?

2. When the bedding is turning into a lot of worm casting will the castings loose their potency whenever I mist them down?

Thanks for your time. Have a good night.
Michael 

Hi Michael, 

On the first question…regarding fluffing your newspaper.  The better you fluff the bedding, the better your worms will do.  It takes work…sometimes a good 30 minutes to make a great bedding.  Not much way to shortcut it.  If you don’t separate the “Stuck” papers well, you will create an anaerobic, (stinky) environment.  The good thing is, you only have to fluff the bedding every few months(when you put in new bedding). 

The castings will not lose their potency when misting.  In fact, just the opposite.  You are making the bedding condusive to the worms, so they are going to continue to process the bedding.  Even though it looks like all the food is gone, the worms are usually continuing to eat the stuff.

Have fun!