How Worms Survive the Winter

Even in our cold Canadian climate, worm composting can be successfully accomplished outdoors year after year, with little hassle.

The Proof is in the Compost

You may wonder how this is possible. Glenn Munroe, a researcher at the Organic Agriculture Centre of Canada, was also curious.

He studied what was happening inside the long windrows of worm compost on a farm in Nova Scotia. What he found was that, during the winter months, the worms migrated within the windrows so that they were located at the center and towards the southern end of the heap (the warmest spot). He also found worms that were almost completely encased in ice (only having room to move their heads) could be thawed out and continue to function normally. He concluded that the worms die from freezing only when they’re prevented from eating! He documented his findings in a 56 page manual titled the Manual of On Farm Vermicomposting and Vermiculture. (see page 15)

Cryogenic Worm Eggs!

Previous studies by the Nova Scotia Agricultural College (NSAC) had confirmed that the cocoons or “eggs” of compost worms can survive deep freezing for extended periods of time and still hatch out healthy and hungry baby worms.2

So even if your worms do freeze or “die by starvation,” their cocoons will remain and hatch the following spring!

This is why many gardeners have been pleasantly surprised to find thriving populations of compost worms in their outdoor bins for many years after introducing them.

Important Considerations Before You Begin

That said, you can’t throw worms into an outdoor bin all willy nilly and expect them to survive.

There are a few worm hazards that must be considered before you begin.
Here are the 7 Habits of Successful Outdoor Vermicomposters.

1) The composter must be stationary. Not the rolling or turning kind.
2) It should be placed in a shady location to avoid overheating.
3) Go easy on the grass clippings as overheating can occur through their decomposition.
4) Place a wire mesh beneath the composter to prevent voles and moles from snacking on your worms.
5) No need to turn your compost, the worms will do it for you!!
6) Remember to add a carbon source (like newspaper) on occasion to give them a balanced diet.
7) Avoid adding citrus, onion and garlic waste as these are organic pesticides.

As long as you keep these conditions in their favor, your worms will never leave you.
In fact, they’ll stay right where their food is located.

Research Articles Mentioned In This Post

1) Manual of On-Farm Vermicomposting and Vermiculture by Glenn Munro, Organic Agriculture Centre of Canada
2) GEORG 2004, Feasibility of Developing the Organic and Transitional Farm Market for Processing Municipal and Farm Organic Wastes Using Large-Scale Vermicomposting Good Earth Organic Resources Group, Halifax

All images and text on this site are Copyrighted and protected by law.
Copyright © Capital Worm Ranch 2010, All Rights Reserved

If you’d like to purchase the Worm Factory composting system viewed in this video, please visit our store.

Capital Worm Ranch

It’s official!

The Ottawa Farmer’s Market is open for business.

If you live in Ottawa, or if you’re in town for a visit, feel free to stop by our big brown tent.

We’ll be there every Sunday until mid November.

All images and text on this site are Copyrighted and protected by law.
Copyright © Capital Worm Ranch 2010, All Rights Reserved

Worm grunting is a method of capturing worms by coaxing them to the surface of the soil. A metal or wooden rod is placed firmly into the ground and vibrated by dragging a second piece of wood or metal across the top.  Studies have shown that these vibrations  mimic the sounds of underground predators, such as moles (Catania, K.C., 2008).

Sopchoppy Festival

Every spring worm grunters and would be worm grunters gather in Sopchoppy Florida for the Annual Worm Grunting Festival. The 9th annual event was held this past week (April 6 to 11th). Competitions and workshops were geared towards all members, young and old, preparing them to line their bait cans in time for the fishing season.

Grunting for Dough

Some people choose to make a living out of worm grunting. Gary & Audrey Revell, who are featured in the video below, have used worm grunting as their sole source of family income for over 40 years.  It’s been purported to be quite lucrative (Kuralt, C. 1972). Professional worm grunters claim, however, that the sluggish economy is hurting business as fewer people are fishing.

I beg to differ. In fact, worm farmers across North America are running short on worm supplies due to an excessive demand for worms this year. There are barely enough worms to supply the composting community because the wigglers are being snapped up by fisherman.

So how much can you make in a worm grunting career? For now the Revells are remaining tight lipped about their incomes. But they’ve been generous enough to share a peak into their typical days at the office.

Answer: Sow bugs and pill bugs (together called woodlice) are very beneficial in outdoor composters. Like earthworms, these guys act as primary decomposers–breaking down leaves, straw and twigs. Their droppings feed beneficial micro organisms thus increasing the quality of the soil.

In fact, many gardeners will add them to their indoor worm bins to further capitalize on their positive effects. Others may inadvertently introduce these critters by adding leaf litter, straw and twigs. The downside to adding woodlice to your indoor worm bin is that they may stray from the bin when conditions are unfavorable to them. While they pose no harm within the home, they’re often viewed as unwelcome guests.  For this reason, we strongly advise against adding sow bugs and outdoor leaf litter to your indoor worm bin.

If you already have woodlice in your bin, there are a number of methods for getting rid of them.

Hand Picking: If you’re not squeamish you can simply hand pick the woodlice out of your bin. They won’t leave their eggs behind as these are carried in pouches under their abdomens, along with baby woodlice.

Trapping: I’ve read that by cutting a cantaloupe in half, scooping out the seeds and placing the shell on top of the bedding (flesh side down), you can attract all of the woodlice into the dark cave of the fruit. After a few hours the cantaloupe and woodlice can be scooped out of the bin and place in your garden. I’ve never tried this method for woodlice, but I know that this works very well for controlling mite populations in my bin.

Woodlice are also attracted to beer.  A shallow dish of beer placed on top of the bedding can serve as a trap into which the woodlice will fall and drown.

Harvesting: You may wish to start fresh by harvesting your worms and placing them into new bedding. When using this option, you’ll want to remove all of the old bedding from the worms. This can be achieved by following the stacking method of harvesting and then dumping the worm spaghetti mound into a fresh clean bed. As the worms work their way into the bedding, scrape off any residual compost. This will ensure that no sow bugs are being transferred to the new bin.

But, keep in mind that you’re also eliminating the other beneficial critters that were helping your original system. As such, it may take a few weeks to get your new bin up and running. Feed sparingly for the first 3 weeks to give the system time to recover.

Woodlice – Up Close and Personal

The instructions indicate that we can give them a ½ pound of food a day, but we have found that to be way too much.  In fact, we’ve only fed them a few times and they are still working through that food.  Can you help us out here?

Answer:

It will take a few weeks for the ecosystem within your bin to become established. There are a lot of little bin critters who assist the worms in breaking down the food. In some cases the critters eat the food and the worms eat the critters. It is always best to feed sparingly for the first 4 weeks while things get up and running.

Another thing to consider is the state of decomposition of your feedings. All foods must mellow or bloom before the worms can consume them. Items like melons, pineapples and pumpkins take very little time (3 days or so) to mellow enough for the worms to consume. Other foods, like potato skins, carrots, cabbages etc. could take months to bloom without your help. And, in fact, may root and grow in the bin.

For carrots and potatoes, we find the best solution is to throw them into the slow cooker for an afternoon to soften them up before adding to the bin. In the case of cabbage, we cut it up and place it in the freezer until hard, then thaw in a sink of warm water before adding.

Never add foods that have salt, pepper, butter or sauces on them. These will kill your ecosystem and the bin will take several weeks to get going again.

NOTE: If you ever make an error and find yourself killing off your worms and/or ecosystem (which can happen if the food heats up too much during decomposition – a common problem when too much starchy foods, like rice, are added at one time). Do not throw your entire bin contents away. Simply scoop out the bad feeding. Then feed very sparingly for a few weeks and your bin should regenerate as the worm eggs hatch.

Why Are There So Many Fruit Flies?

Although you can’t see them, fruit fly eggs are literally coating most of the produce that you bring home from the store. A female fruit fly can lay 20+ eggs per day and can store sperm in her body for up to 2 weeks. That’s the potential for over 280 eggs per fly in just two weeks! Fortunately, by thinking like a fruit fly you can successfully lead them down the path to defeat. Here are some easy steps to get them under control.

Step 1 – Form A Barrier

Fruit flies will naturally be attracted to the worm bin if any decaying organic matter is accessible to them. You should therefore bury all feeds under a good 4 inches of bedding. An old piece of carpet or burlap placed over the bedding will work as an extra barrier. These will also prevent any developing fruit flies from getting out of the bin.

Step 2 – Feed Their Addictions

Create the most irresistible source of fermentation to draw the flies away from the worm bin. Fruit flies and their larvae are attracted to fermentation since they feed on yeast. They’ll do anything to get to the source.  This makes them easy pray for the attract and trap method of management.

Start by creating an intoxicating brew and housing it in a container with a very small hole–just large enough for the fruit fly to get in. You’d be surprised at how many fruit flies will find a tiny hole and enter your trap provided your brew is strong enough to guide them.

Step 3 – Challenge Their Intelligence

Once inside the trap, the fruit flies will no longer have the sense of smell to guide them out. The key, then, is to make a complicated exit path, thus trapping them inside.

Jenn’s Cheap & Easy Fruit Fly Trap

This past summer I discovered that a sport cap water bottle is a very effective trap for fruit flies. When the sport cap is pulled open the holes are just big enough for the fruit flies to enter, yet the cap poses a complicated exit that most will not get out of.

To draw the fruit flies in, I throw a few pieces of pineapple in the bottom. It will take a couple days for the pineapple to ferment. But when its ripe enough, the fruit flies will enter the trap in droves! As the trap fills up, just press down the sport cap, rinse the bottle outside and start again.

Fermented pineapple in a sport cap water bottle.

Today’s event in Ottawa was a great success. The weather was balmy and the Ron Kolbus Centre was packed from 10:00 am to 3:00 pm.

I set up a table to promote worm composting and brought along some coconut coir and finished worm compost to sell. Our table had a steady stream of visitors of all ages with lots of questions about worms and worm composting. Our big bucket of red wigglers was a great attention grabber! It appears that the idea of vermicomposting is especially hot this year. And I’m very excited about that.

I’d like to extend a big old Howdy-do to any of you who stopped by my table. I’ll be using many of your questions to guide the next few posts.

The path to our back yard composter.

The path towards indoor vermicomposting was a natural one for me.  I love finding ways to expend the least amount of effort to accomplish the greatest number of tasks.

I used to loath the trip to the backyard composter throughout the winter. I’d stow my compostables in heaps and counter top buckets for several days just to avoid making the trip. It usually took more than one scurry to get it all out when I finally needed counter space or when the smell kicked me into action.

It was during one of these awful drudges, when the snow was up to my waist, that I decided to attempt vermicomposting.

Rough Start

Getting started wasn’t easy. The first hurdle was acquiring suitable worms.  I initially opted for red wigglers over  european nightcrawlers because I wanted them to multiply quickly and I was more partial to their slender appearance.  There were no worm farms in the Ottawa area and none of the mail order worm companies could ship them in the cold.  I had to wait until spring to get my seed stock of reds.

When I finally got started I was already getting into my yard work and my yearly search for organic materials (leaf litter, newspaper, manure etc) to add to my garden beds.  After waiting so long to acquire my worms, I was naturally disappointed to learn that I’d have to wait yet another 3 months before harvesting vermicompost from my new bin. If I hadn’t been so determined to give it a try, I may have just given up.  But I’m really glad I stuck to it.

Convenience was my main motivation for starting a vermicomposter. But many rewards have followed.

A Unique Pet

The first reward being the worms themselves. I was surprised to find myself checking them often to see what foods they liked and where they were hanging out. My husband would notice me checking them and he’d come check them too. I’m sure that sounds strange to some.  But we hadn’t expected the worms to be so intriguing.

A few months after we got the worms I grew some sprouts in the bin to make it more esthetically pleasing. I was walking by my sprouts one day and I must have disturbed the worms because the sprouts started shifting about. It was hilarious! For a long time after that we continued to grow sprouts in the bin just so the kids could have fun tapping the sides and watching the sprouts move.

Gardener’s Delight

Now that I have several pounds of worms composting throughout the year,  I have plenty of worm castings to spare each spring.  This alone has saved me more money than the initial costs of getting started. I don’t buy artifical fertilizers and my plants are much healthier than my past crops.  Due to the high content of available nutrients in worm castings, my plants are also able to fend off pests and tolerate diseases without assistance. I’ve never had so many tomatoes per plant as I do now. I’ve been using sheep manure for years. But nothing tops vermicompost.

Friends Forever

The worms have paid us back in many ways. I will always have at least one worm bin in my home. It was definately worth the wait.

There are 23 known species of earthworms in Canada. Nearly all of them are thought to have been introduced following the ice age. Scientists believe that the glaciers wiped out every native Canadian earthworm species. But is it possible that some survived?

This is one question that Dr. Jill Clapperton hopes to answer through a five year earthworm census called Worm Watch. This program combines the efforts of public citizens, farmers, school children and scientists in a nationwide survey of species found using standardized investigative methods.  All participants are welcome!

To aid in this survey, the Worm Watch team has made species identification resources available through the web.

If you’d like to identify a specific worm species you can compare characteristics using the General Earthworm Diagram and cross reference your observations with the Taxonomic Key. Visit the Field Guide to Earthworms to confirm your identification and to gain further information about each species.

Or you can simply compare your worm specimen to photos of known species.

Unidentified Canadian Worms

If you find a worm that you can’t identify using these charts and photos, you may wish to send it to Dr. Clapperton for further investigation. So far the Worm Watch program has lead to the discovery of three new species of earthworms in Canada! There are worms in Vancouver Island, Alberta and northern Ontario that have not been found anywhere else in the world. This leaves the door wide open to the possibility that some native Canadian species may have survived the ice age.

Giant Gipsland Earthworms

Ever wonder how large earthworms can be?  David Attenborough was amazed by the enormity of these Gipsland earthworms, which could clearly be heard sloshing through the soil as he walked above their tunnels. Currently, these are the largest earthworms ever found.