How do i start a white worm or microworm culture?

Question

and breed them

Answer 1

THis is right out of the book:

In a large tray or shallow tub place earth and mulched leaves.

2. Water the soil and place the worms on the dirt. Sprinkle bread crumbs or sliced bread on the dirt. Oatmeal has been recommended by some.

3. Place a sheet of glass over the tray and cover the entire unit with a sheet or blanket. Make sure that the glass is touching every part of the container.

4. Place the tray in a damp  place at  room temperature and leave it alone for 2 or 3 weeks. Varying temperatures will affect the maturation process.

5. WHen you unwrap the tray, the underside of the glass plate will be covered with white worms. Scrape them off and feed them to your fish. Hope I helped!

Answer 2

White Worm:  Go the garden store and buy a bag of sterile potting soil--without any fertilizer chemicals added--organic is best.  Also buy a brick of coconut fiber.  When you get home, break the coco-fiber into chunks (it will expand 2 to 3 times as large as the chunk), put them in a microwave container with about 2 the amount of water as the size of the chunk.  Zap it for 1 to 2 mins so the chunk softens up and absorbs the water (add more water if necessary).  Let that cool and then crumble it.  Mix equal part of coco-fiber with potting soil and put about 1-2" of the mix in the bottom of the worm container (I use large Ziplock storage food boxes).  Add a little water and zap again to make sure the potting soil doesn't have anything living in it.  Let it cool.  Dump the starter culture of worms into the mix, put on the lid and punch hole in it (I use a pushpin but anything will do so long as you the worms can get air--you need the cover to keep the soil moist).  Let the worms burrow and get used to their new home for about a week.  After a week, start sprinkling just a pinch of either Gerber baby cereal or flake fish food (crushed) on the surface of the soil, cover and give the worms a few days to come out and eat.  Check on them daily (if the food amount isn't disappearing after a week, mix it into the soil and wait another week--sometimes the worms are eating the stuff in the soil first and aren't hungry yet).  Once you find your worms are swarming the food you give them, that's good.  I usually let them eat and breed for at least a month before trying to harvest.  Upon the first good harvest you can do, always start another box just in case the first one crashes.  White worms like the temp to be in the mid-60 to mid-70s; if the temp goes to the upper 80s or higher, you'll need to put them somewhere cooler (but not cold) or they will melt (and reek).  Always keep them in a cool dark place where they won't get a lot of disturbance.  Once the culture really gets going, feed your worms only as much as they'll eat in 2 days (so their food won't go moldy).  Since the moisture in the box is high, you won't need to spray the food and then your box won't go bad quite as quickly.  Eventually the box will get too watery and hopefully by then you'll have other boxes already well on their way.

Microworms:  Gerber's baby cereal (I like the oatmeal), although you can use regular oatmeal or a slice of bread.  Put enough water in the oatmeal to make it the consistency of sticky cookie dough (I zap it in the microwave just to smooth it out a bit).  Let it cool.  Spread the cereal in a tub so there's about 1" in the bottom of the tub (I use the 16 oz. clear deli tubs with lids).  Sprinkle just a small pinch of dry yeast (like what you use to make bread, comes in a little pouch) over the oatmeal.  Put in your microworm culture.  Put on lid, punch hole in lid.  Set aside to let the worm breed.  Depending on how warm it is, it should take a week or two for the worms to be fully functional.  You can speed it up by keeping them in a slightly warmer place like under a lamp--but don't let it get too hot or you'll cook your worms instead--but then your tub or worms will go rotten sooner.  As soon as the culture covers all of the oatmeal, start another culture so you'll always have at least one good one ongoing at all times.