The wormery is working. It’s a bit messy (that word again!) but it’s showing what we want it to do. Here are some pictures showing how to layer it up with soil and sand. After that you put worms in and sprinkle some dead leaves and grass on top. Slip the outer case on and let them get on with it.
The final picture shows the vertical worm tracks and if you look closely you can see some of the grass pieces have been carried down into the “earth”.
Darwin was something of a worm expert, and his book The Formation of Vegetable Mould through the Action of Worms, with Observations of their Habits is notable for selling better than On the Origin of Species when first published. I bought a reprint out of curiosity and found it to be more interesting than the title suggests.
One day I must try the paper triangle experiment he suggests.
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See… mess is good. Us creative folks just can’t avoid it!
I feel better now we’ve had this talk. 😉
😉
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Our plumber in Newark dug worms out of our compost heap for fishing bait
We have them too, but they crawl horizontally so they don’t work in the tank. Has to be earthworms for the tank as they burrow vertically. Yes, that is the voice of experience talking…
What species of earthworm do you use?
Hopefully it’s Lumbricus terrestris, but to be honest I just dig them up and chuck them in without looking.
Thanks for the Darwin link; I’d be interested to see/hear the result of your paper triangle experiment.
I will stick some paper triangles in tomorrow after the school leaves and see what happens.
🙂