DNA?

That's how mine are. What should be the "right colour then?

Otis.

Some of my worms look darker than I would expect them to look, and I don't see the orange-yellow rings between the sections. The also look fat and short, so I wonder if I'm only seeing the dark sections, and that makes me think they look darker than they normally look. They look almost the color of the dried up worms you see on the sidewalk the day after a heavy rain. It threw me at first, because I thought they might be dying.

I was just wondering if I was feeding them something that was making them look darker than normal.

sbryce

Is it possible to post some photos. Just create a photobucket account and after uploading pictures, just copy the IMG link into your post.

Did you change anything? I know that recently my worms have been fatter and longer; bigger in general. I attribute this to moving from a small bin system to a larger bin where they have more room to grow. I think they have been different colors too but haven't paid that much attention to that.

The worms look more normal now, except that I have noticed that most of them are on the surface, and not down in the bedding. I had more worms crawling on the walls of the bin this morning than I have ever seen before.

A week or so before they started to look dark, a friend brought over some over-the-hill broccoli and cauliflower. I ground this up and fed it to the worms over the next week. I wonder if that has something to do with it?

I have also been sprinkling some powdered milk into the bedding. That might explain the short and fat worms.

Now I have a lot of rice in the bin. It has been decomposing and is rather nasty smelling. The worms seem to like the goo, but once that is consumed, they move out if it.

Overall the worms look healthy. It seems that no matter what happens in the bin, in a week or so it can all change, if the bin is small.

""I had more worms crawling on the walls of the bin this morning than I have ever seen before.""
Just as a precaution, check if your bin is too wet. You might carefully want to "de-compact" what's in there with a fork or something to get more air/oxygen. My concern is the "powdered milk" (not supposed to put dairy product in it)and "a lot" of rice.

I have been reading the forum postings in http://vermicomposters.ning.com/forum and there it was cautioned repeatedly to add only a little bit of rice at a time. I forget why.

Otis

The reason not to add a lot of rice at one time is that it heats up. I have had that problem in the past. I don't seem to be having it now. We'll see. I just tossed in a bunch more.

The bin has been a bit wet, judging by the amount of leachate in the catch basin. I am still getting used to allowing the moisture from the food to moisten the bedding.