prefeeding feeder worms?

[pcfriedrich]

I thought about doing this for my Oscar; buying some earthworms and letting them crawl around in and eat soggy, crushed up hikari cichlid gold pellets (instead of just dirt) for a week or so before feeding.

anyone else ever do this, or have any info/advice?

 

[fobrinkle]

that sounds like a good idea

 

[craig_uk]

I'd imagine that the "rotting" food will simply kill the words.

If you want to create a "wormery", this is what i used to do.

Cut the top off of a fizzy drinks bottle (ie. coca cola, sprite) (Other brands are available )

Poke a few pin holes in the bottom to allow for drainage.

Fill with a few inches of soil, a few inches of sand, a layer of leaves/veg scraps/grass then repeat til full.

Top with a layer of potatoe peelings, fish pellets, compost, dead leaves, anything veg and dead really.

Throw in a couple of nice big worms (heres where selective breeding comes in)

Cover the top with a black plastic bag (corners are ideal) cut an air hole in there. pop somewhere dark. Water with about 1/2 a liter once a week. In about 3 months you should be crawling with huge worms.

Just take the black covering off, and they'll be there for the picking.

(the sand/soil combo results in huge worms, it is said to aid digestion.)

There we go.

Hardly about cichlids but there is the yorkshire way to grow worms

Hope it comes in handy.
Craggy

 

[pcfriedrich]

actually, my idea was just to stuff the worms with nutrient-rich color enhancing pellets before feeding them to my O.

I appreciate the worm farm hatchery thing, though. I very well may use that. I had no idea they reproduce so quickly.

my Osca lovesa da worms.

 

[pcfriedrich]

actually, now that I'm thinking about it, that would end up being a waste of quite a bit of not cheap pellets.

it would make the worms more nutritious, but a lot of that food would just go to waste...

I've been up all night (work graveyard shift). not thinking so clearly. maybe time for bed.

 

[craig_uk]

Yeah, the pellets wont make a huge amount of difference to worms. if anything, crawling around in a protein rich goop will probably harm them.

The reproduce asexually about 60% of the time (only one parent), so the bigger the worms you start with, the bigger the offspring will be. its a real lesson in evolution...

I too am on the proverbial graveyard shift, hence every post is getting a good editing.

 

[balton777]

I'd imagine that the "rotting" food will simply kill the words.

If you want to create a "wormery", this is what i used to do.

Cut the top off of a fizzy drinks bottle (ie. coca cola, sprite) (Other brands are available )

Poke a few pin holes in the bottom to allow for drainage.

Fill with a few inches of soil, a few inches of sand, a layer of leaves/veg scraps/grass then repeat til full.

Top with a layer of potatoe peelings, fish pellets, compost, dead leaves, anything veg and dead really.

Throw in a couple of nice big worms (heres where selective breeding comes in)

Cover the top with a black plastic bag (corners are ideal) cut an air hole in there. pop somewhere dark. Water with about 1/2 a liter once a week. In about 3 months you should be crawling with huge worms.

Just take the black covering off, and they'll be there for the picking.

(the sand/soil combo results in huge worms, it is said to aid digestion.)

There we go.

Hardly about cichlids but there is the yorkshire way to grow worms

Hope it comes in handy.
Craggy

I didn't know it was so easy. I might try that out. My Jags go nuts over big fat nightcrawlers.

 

[craig_uk]

Yeah, its pretty straight forward all in all.

I used to set up a worm factory every few weeks, leave them in the garage (til my parents found out ) then after 3 months i could have a month of fresh lob worms for fishing. the perch at my local went nuts for them. it was the only way to get through the tiddlers

 

[GreenTerrors]

or just go pick up a box of a dozen night crawlers

 

[pcfriedrich]

sounds like if you picked up a few boxes of 24, and let them sit for a while, you could have a limitless supply of night crawlers reproducing in all your house plants (they would be turning, fertilizing and aerating your soil, also).

you just gotta dig'em out.