They have an iridescent sheen to them in the sun and put up quite a fight as I picked them up. Just want to make sure they’re actually IJWs before I dispose of them properly, and not just really wiggly unhappy worms

Red wigglers (Eisenia fetida) are epigeic worms that naturally inhabit the upper layers of decaying organic matter rather than mineral soil.  Their preferred environments include forest floor leaf litter, rotting logs, compost piles, and animal manure where food is abundant.  They typically reside within the top 2 to 6 inches of this material to maintain moisture and access nutrients while avoiding light.

I tried to search through past posts about a worm bin (I was considering the Urban Worm Company bag) and whether it was common to have bug problems as a result of doing it in my basement. Mainly what I found was thread after thread of bugs in people's bins, so maybe I have my answer. 😂 Is it possible to have a basement worm bin without inviting other pests into the basement? Or are bugs a problem only when you let it get too moist or let it get smelly? I only want the worms and castings.

Hi, I'm extremely knew to all this. I do some minor gardening and recently learned about in-ground worm bins and am considering setting some up. I've got two roughly 2'x8' raised garden beds, about two feet tall. I live in New England. I've done some research and understand the basics of setting them up. My main question has to do with the seasons.

A lot of discussion online seems to be from people in warmer climates where very cold winters aren't an issue. How do the worms handle winter months in my climate? Are my beds large enough to keep them from freezing to death, or, if I set them up once my current growing season is over, will they all just be dead by the time spring rolls around?

Thank you!

It's funny how sometimes your favorite pictures app reminds you of what you did on this day 5-10-15 years ago, this picture was my first attempt to use spent mushrooms blocks in my mix of bedding for my breeders bins... at that point i had unlimited supplies of blocks. First try didn't go well, made bunch of rookies mistakes, took me couple months of trial and error before i hit the jackpot. Morale of the story.. don't ever stop trying

Happy worming

Hi curious if more trained eyes could tell me what’s making up my bin. I’ve been googling but still have a tough time telling apart. Thanks!

My worms seem to not really care about strawberry and veggie scraps I put it, but as soon as watermelon is in, they all climb all over it and it goes so quickly. Does that mean they like it?

What are some other foods they enjoy and finish quickly?

I got around 20 worms for fishing but i never use all of them and usually discard the rest. I usually only go through maybe 3 worms at most so I end up discarding the vast majority. I decided to keep the rest this time and have used them for multiple trips, but they've just been sitting in a mini fridge for this past week still in their original package.

They all emerge at the top whenever I check on them and they don't burrow down in the soil anymore so I'm worried that they'll all die. I think there might be a few dead ones I cut up but didn't fully use and now the soil is too acidic or something.

I did basic google searches and asked AI and it's telling me to discard the old soil and use only shredded soggy paper and to add a little bit of food. Apparently that will keep the leftover worms alive for the remaining months until winter time. But putting them in just paper makes no sense to me, it would be convenient and easy but idk. Will this actually work? If not then what should I do?

I found jumping worms in one of my raised beds. Today when I went to plant in a different raised bed I was looking to see what I could find. At first I found what I think are all some form of red wiggler or similar type Worms. But then I did find a couple that I am pretty sure are jumping worms. They just feel firmer and I can tell the clitellum on two of them are definitely not raised.

I separated them and think I removed any that could be jumping worms from the pile. But how can I be sure if they're younger and I don't see a visible mouth or the white clitellum.

I guess it's not going to be the end of the world if I kill a couple good worms when I separate them. But I'd rather keep as many good worms as I can.

I've got one of those tower bins, established mid-june. I'm getting some level of fungus gnats since the basement isn't perfectly bug-tight. Some of my isopods have fallen in but these are primarily for feeders so I'm not very bothered by it. I was just curious if anyone has gone out of their way to encourage local spiders to take up residence. I got 2 parson spiders chilling with me and the evil thoughts was like what if I gave them a room and food while taking advantage of them being there. I've been tempted to get some local jumpers to put in there. I know they don't particularly like predating on worms but I'm curious if anyone has tried it and had success. I'm on a single level right now (one below has cardboard innoculating, top one is empty) and I'm deciding if I'm off my rockers or not.

And please no set fire to them blah blah, spiders are highly beneficial buggy bois, and I reccomend these are the spiders in your house on YouTube for some sane facts and desensitization to spiders, they are weird and fascinating, and watching a grown man chase spiders with cheese wholly convinced my arachnophobic partner to leave spoods alone when he sees them.

Do these appear to be red wiggler babies? Just found them in a bucket of composting wood chips in my yard. Yellow tails.

Went to harvest my worm bag (after a couple months) and came across several issues. First, the material at the very bottom was WET, like almost a sludge. Second, most of the casting I pulled out were also too wet and clumpy, not crumbly like you want. Third, there is some sort of tough root or fungus material all throughout the bid, to the point that the rest of the bag doesn't want to fall down into the pouch at thr bottom. Ive noticed some mycelium in browns at the top of the bag, but the worms seem to love it so i didnt think it was a problem. Im going to let this batch dry out outside, but with how wet it is im not sure that its viable compost and might be too anaerobic.

Long story short, I think I need 1) more browns, 2) smaller but more frequent feedings, and 3) more frequent harvesting to break up the fungus/roots. But, if anyone has any additional thoughts, please let me know. Still a relative beginner here.

So the bsf guys have entered my setup. I think it started with some corn cobs I threw in there. They took off and have gone to the whole bin. Should I take all these guys out and try giving them to someone that has a reptile or are they not going to be that bad. Seem to coexist with the worms no problem but just don't know how crazy it will be outside once they turn to actually flies. Anyone experienced this?

Hab das heute in der Toilette gefunden. Normalerweise Regenwurm oder Parasit?

I found this in the toilet today. Is it normally an earthworm or a parasite?

They seem pretty content under the wet cardboard, lots of orgies and babies. But so much poo on the sides and lots of worms on sides. Time for a second bin maybe?

Hi all

Sorry, very new vermicomposter here. My worms are at the surface, but seem to be moving. I started this with compost as a base, and coconut fiber as a substrate later added over it. I've been monitoring the moisture, and it overall seems good. When I squeeze it a few drops come out, but not a stream. I haven't added in a few days since it was a fair bit of compost. Internal temp is about 74.4F, so I don't think that's it. I also noticed this kind of whitish worm on the lid. Could that be related? Are they hungry? Any help would be appreciated. Thank you.

Bin is a few weeks in. 300 worms. I over fed at first and then removed a lot of the food and only just started refeeding about 1/2 cup a week. The bin seems pretty airy but I noticed some mites and lots of poop on the walls. Now the worms are on the walls too. I feel like I have a lot of browns. Maybe it isn’t deep enough? Not enough food?

4 corn cob and plenty of pea pods choped together

Hi,

I just started my farm a few weeks back and the internal temperature keeps going up north of the 90s and I lost half of my population to this. It has been low 70s daily and the farm is outside, but not in the sun. What does everyone else do to keep them cool outside? I was thinking building an enclosure with a solar fan to help move air.

TIA

I have since googled it and discovered its mites and not good. i saw these things on the side of bin before but thought they were random insect eggs.... oof looks like they exploded here. bin is probably too moist and too much food but what can I do to solve this and not have to throw my food scraps in trash? I was hoping to make a sort of compost bin that also had worms in it as opposed to a dedicated worm bin.

I fed my cat before leaving for work just his usual cat food tuna and fish based canned wet food he obviously didn’t finish all of it and when i returned from work and went to clean his dish i found these small “worms”? Maggots? Some sort of parasite I think some one help me out!

Most "should I start a worm bin?" questions get answered with enthusiasm. That's probably accurate, but we wanted to understand the pattern across many discussions rather than any single answer.

We went through 67 r/Vermiculture threads and tried to document what new people are actually worried about, what experienced people say they wish they'd known, where the community agrees, and where it doesn't. Then we wrote up what we found.

Short version: for most people we found good reasons to try it, but there are a few things worth knowing first. The report covers those.

Full analysis: https://decisionatlas.org/investigations/inv-001/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=post&utm_campaign=de-002

This is the community whose accounts we drew on, so we're especially interested in corrections. If something in the analysis doesn't match your experience or oversimplifies what you know, that's what we'd genuinely like to hear.