My good friend, and Worm Farming Alliance member, Lonnie Sibley, recently wrote an article describing the in-ground worm bed he built last fall for raising Red Worms.
After seeing the heap of rocks he had to remove from the excavation site, I promise I will never complain again about the one or two field stones I tend to encounter when digging a new vermicomposting trench!
I can honestly say that I’ve never had to use a pick axe to create a worm bed!
😆
Lonnie gets some pretty cold winter weather where he lives in Missouri – and he mentions that the top 4-5 inches did freeze. But thanks to the thick layer of horse manure he heaped over the top, the worms did just fine down below. During a warm spell in January he checked up on the system and found plenty of big, healthy Reds. I can only imagine how things will be looking in coming weeks as things really start to warm up.
What’s great, is that Lonnie’s bed should work well in the summer as well. It’s located in a sheltered part of the yard and extends down below the soil surface, so there should always be some zones where the worms can find temperatures to their liking!
Anyway – I don’t want to steal Lonnie’s thunder too much here. Be sure to go check out the article for yourself:
**Want Even More Fun With Worms? Sign Up for the RWC E-mail List Today!**
“Help in Hawaii”! Please forgive me for interrupting your forum, but I’m kind of at a lost as what to do, or who to contact? – I am a fellow worm farmer for over two years now and have just had my binds devastated by some kind of caterpillar type grub. I feed my worms usually every other day and they have been healthy and multiplying. I fed my worms last week Thursday and everything seemed normal until I opened my bin on Saturday, and instead of my worms there was nothing but a mass of these grubs. I removed all four of my bin tiers and it was total annihilation. Who can I call or what can I do? Help very much appreciated! — Aloha.
Hi Sharon,
I’d need to see an image of these grubs to be sure – but my guess is they are some sort of Black Soldier Fly larvae.
Were the worms themselves harmed? BSFLs don’t typically harm the worms – it’s more a matter of outcompeting them.