Home | Register | Sell Item | Closed Auctions | Items Wanted | My Account | Feedback |
|
|
|
|
|
Home | Register | Sell Item | Closed Auctions | Items Wanted | My Account | Feedback | |
|
| WHITE WORMS - 3oz culture, warm temperature strain |
| Item #1576323003 |
Current Auction Time: Tue Apr 23 06:41:36 2024
|
|
Final: | $14.00 | First Bid | $14.00 | ||
| Time left | 00:00 | # of Bids | 1 (bid history) | |||
| Started | Dec 7 2019 - 05:30:03 AM | Location | Veneta OR 87982 United States | |||
| Ended | Dec 14 2019 - 05:30:03 AM Auction Closed |
|||||
| Seller | Food (354/358)  |
|||||
| (View seller's feedback) (view seller's current auctions) (ask seller a question) | ||||||
| High Bidder | Hellisamongus (24/24)  |
|||||
| Payment | See Item Description, PayPal | |||||
| Shipping | Will Ship to United States Only Buyer Pays Fixed Amount, See Item Description | |||||
Seller assumes all responsibility for listing this item. You should contact the seller to resolve any questions before bidding. Currency is U.S. dollars (US$) unless otherwise noted. |
PAYMENT:
$14 total. Includes First Class Flat shipping without tracking.
My paypal is a business account and accepts credit/debit.
Make payment with Paypal at: ryanthehut@gmail.com
If you order this, along with one of my daphnia & scud auctions, I can ship both together. There is no discount in shipping, as it doesn't save much in shipping cost, but being the daphnia/scud culture package has extra room I'm able to send much more worm culture.
CULTURE:
This is for 3 ounces of established medium, several dozen worms of a temperate strain, and an unknown number of eggs. If I have extra worms, which I almost always do, I will add more. The image is an example of what you receive and makes a deli container size culture. It ships First Class Flat without a tracking number, however, the post office provides an estimated delivery date on the receipt which I inform you of. They ship safely year round, including winter.
Why white worms as a live food?:
White worms are easily my favorite live food to culture. There is nothing tricky about them and they produce enormous harvests year round. I have kept this particular strain continuously well over a decade, in my garage on a shelf, and never had a problem.
How productive are they? Compare them to daphnia, something that is itself considered highly productive. A one gallon daphnia culture will contain around 100 daphnia, and each week you can harvest 20% of them. A one gallon white worm culture would contain 1000's of worms, and each week you harvest about 10% of the worms. The difference is 20 daphnia to 100's of worms harvested each week. Not only are white worm cultures insanely productive they are one of the best things you can feed your fish.
There are many reasons why I like white worms: they will live in an aquarium for weeks, don't sink into aquarium gravel, can be gut loaded with other foods beneficial to fish, require virtually no care, a culture has no odor, and they will feed any size fish.
Tip: Though they will live submerged for weeks, if you euthanize them first, they start to disintegrate almost immediately. Fry eagerly pick them apart. This is how I feed my fry and nothing makes them grow as fast as white worms.
CULTURE BASICS:
Medium:
I find most bagged soil, peat, and cocofiber works well. I use cocofiber but don't recommend it more than other products. Avoid products where fertilizer or sand is added. All these products are all inexpensive so try several to see which work best. They like their medium on the wetter side. White worms are semi aquatic in some aspects so don't worry you are drowning them. Anything from nicely damp to fully saturated works good.
Food:
They eat like any regular composting worm so they aren't picky about their diet. They like bread, cereal, rice, potato, and softened fruits & vegetables. They require their food to be wet and soft. To keep food from drying out in the culture dig an indentation in the medium and place the food in that.
Temperature:
There is a lot of inaccurate/misleading information suggesting white worms be kept at temperatures in the lower 60's. The term 'white worm' contains a number of unidentified species & lineages, is found at many locations around the globe including large portions of the United States, and many strains have been in the hobby for decades. There is one particular worm, Enchytraeus Albidus, that has been studied more than others because it has interesting cold resistant characteristics and likes those low temperatures you see quoted so often, which makes some people believe it's 'the white worm', but it's only one of many different species; there is nothing even verifying that it is the species commonly circulated in the hobby as white worm. My point is treat each white worm strain as possibly being a completely different species, or a strain that is so far removed from the wild its developed/evolved significantly. None of this should concern you, as the worms themselves tend to be similar, but not all are kept at the same temperature.
What are my local temperatures? My outside temperatures range from 20 to 110 degrees, with cultures temperatures freezing to reaching the mid 80's, and I harvest year round. Keep in mind this is a 'temperate' strain so 40 to 75 degrees is ideal. We regulate our aquarium temperatures because tropical fish aren't temperature resilient, but that isn't the case for temperate animals that evolved with more seasonal weather, like many species of white worm. I have cultured this strain for over a decade at these temperatures and harvest year round. A cool place in your home, somewhere/thing to protect them from excessive heat, is all that is needed for my strain.
If you live where it's hotter than West Oregon, and don't have a cool place for a culture, some things you can try are: a frozen water bottle as needed, being a culture is so damp a fan blowing across a culture acts like an air conditioner, placing the culture in contact with a home cold water line, or a home kitchen cooling plate placed under the culture.
I find my strain of white worms very temperature resilient. My cultures get covered in ice during the winter, and in the summer culture temperatures reach into the mid 80's. In many aspects WW are much more temperature resilient than grindals, which like to be kept on the warm side, and why I prefer them. I can't culture grindal worms in my garage year round without somehow keeping their cultures warm, but white worms find my garage temperatures cozy most of the year.
Temperature made simple: For best results obtain a strain that is kept at a temperature range you will be keeping them at. Mine are kept in the garage, and range from freezing to the 80's, with 50 to the 75 degrees being typical. Don't get caught up in the temperature discussion as most people have never explored the topic, and those that quote the same low temperature are regurgitating very old, narrow, and inaccurate information.
Culture Invaders / Mites:
This is another topic with a lot of inaccurate information. Every organism has its parasites, but because it's something easily visible in a WW culture, it gets discussed disproportionately. Mites are usually a non issue because there are very few creatures that want to bite living worms when there are hundreds available that die naturally each week. Considering a typical white worm culture contains thousands of worms, where hundreds die each week - something needs to help consume/reduce them. An invasive mite may actually be providing a necessary service.
If you do have an invader making an impact on your culture you can mitigate it...doing something that reduces it's population. For example, taping the container drives the worms into the medium, allowing you to easily remove the top layer of medium. Place that on a plate and the 'mites' will eventually walk off it, then add it back into the culture. Another mitigation tip is to flood the culture for a few hours to several days - which drowns the invaders but doesn't bother the worms.
To help keep out invaders cover the culture in a pillowcase. However, being most invaders start out microscopic in size, it's nearly impossible to keep them out for any length of time. In the decades in keeping this worm I've never had a mite significantly impact a culture. This is an over discussed topic by people regurgitating hype.
Harvesting:
Place a plastic deli lid over their food and the worms will crawl onto it.
GUARANTEE:
If DOA I will send a replacement at no cost. Please don't file a return as that usually adds additional steps for us both - just message me know and I will send another without a guilt trip.
FYI: During shipping distance isn't a risk factor. What will kill the culture is if it's left in the elements after being delivered to your home. It's critical the package not be left in your mailbox so meet your mail carrier.
INSTRUCTIONS AFTER RECEIVING PACKAGE:
White worms are long and can be damaged if overhandled. Don't stir or rummage through the medium after you receive it.
Add the medium into a deli container. Poke a couple small holes in the lid with a tac.
I remove moisture from the medium prior to shipping so it doesn't leech water into the packaging. When in their new container add water.
Add a few wet cheerios to the center. If they worms don't gather around it that's okay - they are just finishing the remaining food I added.
Place your new culture in a cool location.
WHITE WORM MAN:
For additional culturing content visit my Facebook page and YouTube channel:
YouTube Channel
Facebook Page
Bid History:
Bidders Bid Time Bid Comments Hellisamongus (24/24) Dec 8 2019 - 06:36:45 PM $14.00 BUY IT NOW
|
| Help / FAQs | Policies | Forum | Search | |
