Two Tailed Worm

Found this little guy while sorting through a bin. Too much coffee??

The Set-Up

The story began when the family decided to go fishing. A few of us ventured out back after dark and began hunting for night crawlers in the area that I had heavily watered earlier in the day. We were amazed to catch a good number of them and we placed them into an empty Gatorade container to be used as bait the next day at Trial Lake.

We had great fun and success the first day fishing, so he decision was made to do the same the next week. We repeated the same ritual of catching night crawlers the night before heading to the lake. This time at the lake, we found ourselves using the entire supply of night crawlers and left when the bait was no more.

We decided to go a third time. This time we caught many, many night crawlers so as not to run out on this trip. We took 96. We used a lot of them, but when we came back, we had maybe 20 or 30 left. The best thing may have been to return the worms to the soil, but I had an idea…the start of many ill fated adventures!

My idea went back to the time I spent with my grandfather in summers long gone. We fished nearly every weekend at Strawberry reservoir. We would, during the week, shock worms up out of the yard and place them into an old refrigerator that had been ¾ buried in the shade of the northern side of the southern fence.

Inside the refrigerator, or worm bin, was a layer of soil and then layers of burlap sack. Within the layers of burlap the worms would find coffee grounds, kitchen scraps, and moisture. The night crawlers, once removed from the lawn, would find a home in the soil and plenty of night crawler social life within the layers of burlap.

When it became time for fishing, one needed only to lift open the door of the worm bin and pick through a couple of layers of burlap to find all the worms one would need for a weekend of fishing. When we returned, the remaining worms would go back into the bin and replacement crawlers caught during the week. The goal was always to replace more than what we had used.

Upon returning from Trial Lake, I decided to start my own worm bin. I wanted to eliminate the need to catch worms the night before and somehow begin a sustainable population of my own and maybe recreate the memories and fondness I held for those times spent with my grandfather but this time with my children.

So as any great idea that needs further information in our age, I “Googled” “raising night crawlers”.

Google-ing Worms

Google is a wonderful thing.
A few flicks of the fingertips and I was deluged with the all the facts, myths and wonders of a new world called Vermicomposting. I quickly found that the night crawlers that I was holding in hopes of a new "Segmented Empire" were not highly praised as worms worth raising. Instead there were other breeds that not only could be worms as it pertained to fishing bait, but were also a powerful tool in generating soil and recycling. These other worms were not single faceted but…well, multi-faceted! These super worms were the African and the European Night crawler and the Red worm.

What’s A Worm?- Part 1

Bait is bait.

The Northern or Canadian night crawlers to which I was so accustomed, are the Premier in this category. They are fat and juicy and grow big. They, however, do not grow fast. In fact they grow so slowly that it is considered nearly impossible to raise them in a bin structure. You might be able to keep them alive for long periods of a time, they may even grow big and fat, but they will not establish a self-sustaining population of any size; maybe for a small personal stash, but it could never be expanded into a commercial endeavor. Northerns are harvested on golf courses and farm land at night wit guys with lights and buckets. They are then boxed and sent out to fishermen everywhere. In one report that I saw, Canada reported over 500,000,000 night crawlers were exported. Wow!

African and European night crawlers are not as big and they are not as fat, but they grow fast and don’t mind being housed and raised in bins. One day, they might challenge the Northerns but only because of their tolerance to heat. No more explaining to the wife why the worms are in the cooler or worse, the refrigerator!

Red worms are just not big. They may work fine for small fish and small hooks, but what’s the fun in that??!!

What’s A Worm?- Part 2

Is bait the only thing for which a worm is good?

No, they are also soil builders. In nature, everything has a job to do. If we leave worms alone, the will happily go about their business of producing top rate soil that plants will die for…actually live for. You see the role of a composting worm is to devour decomposing organic material and leave behind rich soil. This soil, called castings (which is worm manure), is everything a plant could dream of. It provides moisture retention, microbes that allow the plant to drink more easily and the soil conditioner that allows for great aeration and body.

Northerns are “soil dwellers", meaning they like to dig in the dirt. They, I found, like to dig down deep where the soil is cool and when it is wet enough, tunnel their way to the surfaces. Although they like to dig in the dirt, they don’t like to dig new tunnels, but instead maintain networks of tunnels that connect them to their burrows. Within these burrows, they will drag leaves, grass and other organic material form the surface and to eat at their leisure. These networks of tunnels are great for the aeration of the soil, and provide for a great method of transferring materials form the subsoil to the top soil and vice versa. They are not great at the process of composting, at least not like the other worms.

African and European Night crawlers and Red worms are composting worms. The kings are the red worms. They reproduce like crazy, eat from 50-100% of their weight each day in organic material and can produce almost the same amount of castings. The castings can then be added to any soil or used as a top dressing to dramatically improve plant growth. Studies have shown a 3-5 times increase in growth rate of the plants planted in the casting enhanced soil over plants in natural soil or even potting soil. The worms themselves can make the world a green place.

Having bait around is good, but if that bait can also help grow the lawn, plants and the garden grow better as well, the choice of worms to raise becomes more clear.

What’s A Worm? Part 3

Organic material?

Like what kind of organic material am I talking about? Kitchen scraps, coffee grounds, shredded newspaper, cardboard and paper. Many of the things we just throw out or wash down the garbage disposal and into the sewer system. If every pound of composting worms eat one pound of material or garbage every two days, can that make a difference? Every pound of garbage that worms dispose of is one pound that doesn’t make it into the landfill or sewer system. And every pound of garbage consumed, equals about one pound of new soil generated. It is a perfect recycling system.

The process is called vermicomposting. It works the same way that the traditional composting process works, only using worms to do the work, at least most of it. If the right kind of worm is used and they are given the right conditions, they will work for their entire lives, happy as…well as worms in a worm bin.

This piece of information really caught my attention! I could see that I could make a difference. If I could get enough worms to divert our family’s garbage from the garbage, I could save about a pound a day from going to the landfill and wasting water to run the disposal and sending more items to the sewer system. If we could divert one pound a day, that would be 365 pounds a year. Yeah I know, big deal. But what if I could also convince 100 other people to change. Or a thoudsand. Or Ten thousand. My 365 pounds could become 3,650,000 pounds of garbage diverted form the landfill.

That much garbage would produce at least 3,000,000 pounds of top soil, that would in turn help the plants grow better, which helps the production of oxygen, and creates more green space which creates a cooling effect of that area.

In addition, the soil could retain more water, reducing the demand for increased watering, and reducing the need for chemical fertilizers that leach nutrients out of the soil and places contaminants into the ground water.

I’m not smart enough to create an alternative fuel to screw the Mideast and oil guys, but I can change the world by recycling garbage, at least my little part of it. And by beginning a worm composting business to help others begin their vermicomposting efforts, I believe we can make a difference…from the ground up.

The Africans Arrive!

Once the decision was made to venture into the worm industry, one web site that I found appealing and full of basic information was UNCO industries. They were offering a “cultured” night crawler. I assumed this may have been a northern night crawler that had been harnessed enough to learn how to be used as a compost worm. I took the bait as it was and ordered a pound of them.

I was intrigued with their offer to view their business proposal, but did not want to spend the $45 to view the video. I figured I would still want to venture into the business slowly.

I received the worms and thus began the Jensen Worm Farm.