I don't see why you can't go worm hunting. Cool wet days of Spring are choice. Under stones and logs usually, when raining they come to the top and can be collected in quantity. While you wait on your shipment, your bin will already be inoculated with worms and hopefully a little dirt from where they came from. Peat moss is expensive and cardboard and newspapers are free for the taking. If you come across black leaf litter, pounce on it for your bin mix. Black cow will be great for the worms. Sprinkle a little wet corn meal or leave a melon rind under some wet cardboard on top if you're worried about food.

I don't think you need peat moss or manure for a worm bin. What are you planning to use for bedding? I've always used shredded cardboard and paper, which is free, and I always have lots of the raw material on hand. (I need to think up some other use for the coir block that came with my Worm Factory, because I never used it.)

I'm not sure what a worm in "shock" would look like (would you put little blankets on them?) but I don't think they are as fragile as all that! It takes them a little time to move all the way through the new material in a worm bin, but that's normal.

Note that "top feeder" WRT red wigglers just means they don't burrow down into the soil layer like nightcrawlers and other soil-dwelling worms. They don't literally lie on the top of the bedding to eat. They move around in the top 4-10 inches of material, give or take. The main reasons to bury food in the bedding are to keep the stink down and make it more difficult for fruit flies to lay eggs on it. A fruit fly invasion is a real pain, so it's worthwhile to avoid this.

The highly technical method of seeing if the bedding material is moist enough is called "sticking your hand in there." Also seeing if the worms are moving through it all, because they won't hang out in areas that are too dry for them. If you are using a plastic bin it usually retains moisture from the breakdown of the food quite well, so your need to sprinkle water may not be very great. Just soak and squeeze out the bedding at the beginning, before the worms go in.

If you want to capture red wigglers in the wild, see if you can find some cow pats or stable manure. I understand these are red wigglers' hottest hangouts. You can also get them from bait shops, but I'm always told they're more expensive and you get fewer worms that way.

My relatively few suggestions for starting: shredded cardboard (corrugated) in advance, slightly damp, far more than you think you might want/need. Worry less about the drainage, and more about not getting it too wet. Start your bin - cardboard, lots of it, small amounts of food scraps, perhaps dead damp partially decomposed leaves, and a couple of handfuls or compost and/or soil; mix it, let it sit for a few weeks - just to get the bin 'living' and reduce the 'shock' I think you're talking about. Don't try to rush things - you'll be tempted to give them a lot of food to start, don't. And my own personal biggest tip: the biggest problems that come up are too wet, and not enough bedding (e.g. cardboard)/too much food (usually too much wet food) - so until you're confident, err on the side of too much bedding and not wet. You'll almost never kill worms by having too much bedding. Of course, I don't mean bone-dry, but don't add much water unless you're quite sure it's too dry - and measure 'dry/wet' at levels closer to the bottom, not the top - damp is almost always okay. A layer of dry-ish cardboard/shredded paper at the top buffers changes in humidity and keeps bugs down. All of this, of course, just my own opinion/experience. Let us know how it goes and good luck.

Are you going with indoor bins, or outdoor bins? Sounds like outdoor, but you didn't specify. Makes a difference though, because you have to be much more cautious with indoor bins to avoid a bad experience in your house, or garage, or basement, or shed. I would use a empty juice bottle with very small holes poked into the lid for a "sprinkler" waterer, rather like a version of what Grandma used to 'moisten' clothes for ironing, at least until until you get the hang of how moist or dry your worm species likes their home. You can used shredded or torn paper, brown grocery bags, brown cardbord, and newpapers without advertising inserts to make bedding for your bin that will also feed your worms for weeks and weeks with little supplementation to start. Just toss in a few handfuls of your local soil that is clean and uncontaminated with yard sprays or automotive fluids and a little fine sand to complete the mix. Worms have a gizzard, rather like a chicken, and they will need some fine sand to process their food. The only other thing you might add is a little crushed eggshell, a bit of smashed drywall (gypsum) or a smashed piece of kid's sidewalk chalk, or even a few mashed Tums for the calcium these things can supply so your worms can get to work on cocoons as quickly as possible.

I was planning on using about 3-6 inches of peat moss with some newspaper shredding as bedding. By black leaf litter do you mean partially decomposed leafs form the bottom of my big leaf pile out back? I have a ton of that but I want to keep this bin inside so I don't want all the other insects/mosquitos that come with it.

The videos I watched mentioned 'shocking' the worms by putting them in an unfamiliar environment (no peat moss/too wet or dry) and they die off/ try to escape.

Definitely doing indoor bins. Going to live in my basement that I would say is most often around 65 degrees but varies 10 or so degrees either way.

I had planned on adding coffee grounds for their gizzards.

I got the peat moss idea from uncle jim's worms videos. He says pretty much just put a few inches of slightly moist peat moss (that you can squeeze and get a few drops of water out) and then add a bit of cornmeal on top and that would make them happy to settle in to their new home.

I have some tums I have been amending my soil with and I can add some to the bin when I get it going.

I am definitely heeding the warnings of not a lot of food. I was going to do a bit of corn meal then after a week or two add about 1/4 of a pound of ground scraps once they get acclimated. I think I remember hearing about 1 pound of food per 1,000 wigglers?

I got the worm pee drainage idea from seeing a guy on youtube with a big horse watering trough for a bin and he was getting gallons of 'worm pee' out of it.

Also, on collecting worms from outdoors, I mostly see earthworms and other types. Not many red wigglers. I was lead to believe red wigglers are the best to have? I also read that you need about 250 worms to start a bin and I doubt I can collect that many outdoors. I mean, I have collected worms for fishing before but 250 would be the mother load

The best worms to have are the ones that will meet YOUR needs and uses for them in the conditions you can most easily/efficiency provide for them If they are just for eating your household scraps, then you want a worm that is going to eat what your family discards as rapidly as you can handle/feed them possible in the conditions/environment you can provide for them. For most people, that is probably red wigglers or tiger worms, possibly. I'm in a more wet & tropical environment facing the rainy season right now, and possible temps up to 100° in high summer, even 90° now, and 80-85° in the shade, and the best worm for these conditions really isn't a wiggler, though they can take it up to a point, with enough protection and airflow provided. I am also trying to raise worms that grow large enough to serve as a bait worm or a feeder worm for fish, reptiles, amphibians, chickens, etc. so I am using worms that can grow to about 4-6" and as big around as a pencil with good conditions/care. Just depends on what will work for you, and what you can get there. That said, any worms that are already living local have always seemed the best choice to me --- if they will also take the temps and eat and behave as you need them to. In your situation, you have two bins. Maybe one could be "wilders", and one purchased worms. Just make sure to use separate tools to keep them separate as much as possible. Even if they wind up across bins, they won't likely interbreed unless they are very closely related species, but separating worms could get time consuming, if not just pointless altogether..... ;)

I'm reminded of that stinker Godzilla, when Matt Broderick uses electricity to draw the worms up. Not advocating it, just saying there's more than one way to draw them. We are smarter than them, no offense to worms intended. A tangent, I'm wondering if perforated cardboard on the ground would eventually draw a host of worms. Will let the forum know when I do on that.

I meant just what you thought about the leaves, I didn't realize that your bin will be indoors, so unless you baked them at 350, froze them or nuked them, what a mess, they're out as bedding. Indoors is a tall order, with the worry of drawing non-worm pests inside.

Outdoors it is a team effort, with pill bugs and slugs preparing food for their masters. Getting a homogenous bin to thrive indoors is ambitious and I wish you victory!

Don't pay any attention to anything giving amounts for how much worms eat, you'll have to figure it out by feel. The bit about not 'shocking' is mainly a question of having a bin not be too much of anything, but you can't go wrong with a lot of bedding that's damp, but not soaked. Letting it sit for a few weeks before with a bit of food, soil, and perhaps some compost or worm castings beforehand makes sure it's 'alive' with other microbes and whatnot. Personally I don't worry about trying to add 'grit'.

I thought red wigglers would be the best worm for me because I planned on feeding them blended kitchen scraps (like right now I have some lettuce, sweet peppers, and watermelon that are past their prime) and paper/cardboard. Also, my bin will live in my basement where the temperature probably averages 65 degrees. Since my main goal is to make worm castings it seems like with those conditions the red wigglers would be best?

I think I will put up a wanted add on craigslist because I did a search and only found 1 person selling castings and they were about 45 minutes from me. It just seems a bit crazy to pay $25 or $30 for 1/4 -1/2 pound of worms, that is more than the most expensive cut of some fancy meat I can think of! Would be much more bearable if they were more like $15-20 which im sure would still carry a hefty profit margin.

I already have tums and cornmeal on hand. I wouldn't mind not having to buy the peat moss because out of everything ive talked about the 2 things I don't have are peat moss & worms. But it seems every single bin I have seen used peat moss or peat moss & shredded newspaper. I kinda was going to use this video's set up as my base guide.

And got the stuff about needing some compost/peat moss and needing a lot of drainage from here

It seems everyone uses 2 bins where they put one inside the other supported by cans/bricks, or something in the bottom for separation of the 2 bins. What is the purpose of this if not for harvesting leachate? Maybe I am far over estimating the amount of leachate that would come from an 18 gallon tote because I saw a guy that had a horse trough for a bin and he was getting gallons of leachate? He said it was really great stuff for the garden.

Is anyone here running indoor worm bins?

Sorry to disappoint, TP. I have done a couple of indoor bins before, but never specifically for the purpose of harvesting any leachate or "worm pee". It was simply to have the worms handy to feed my shredded office paper to. Between the regular additions of paper and the de-humidified office air, that kept those bins on the dry side, so I was having to mist them every couple of days just to keep the bin moist. I almost never fed those worms kitchen scraps, unless it was a piece of lettuce, or a bit of bread from lunch. They were in my office about two years, then I converted the office to a bedroom, and moved the worms outdoors. Any worms I've had getting significant amounts of kitchen cast-offs and making "lots" of leachate have all been in outdoor bins, that's all. The point is, that while the bare basics of worm composting are pretty simple, you can customize it, and play with it, and tinker until your system/s work for you and what you are trying to achieve. If you want lots of leachate, you'll want wetter system than I normally do. See?

All my advice above is based 100% on indoor bins. I've never had an outdoor bin. But I feel like I've said everything twice already, so it's probably well past time for you to get your hands on some worms and start your own experiments. And stop watching YouTube! :-)

I think you are right parsley. Thanks for all the help. If I don't get some red wigglers locally then ill probably break down and order some.

But, I also used my lawn mower mulching attachment and gathered up a 32 gallon garbage bin about 1/2 full of leaves and grass.

I put out 2 pieces of bread under corrogated cardboard and 1 piece of just cardboard by itself. I wet the dirt under them and moistened the cardboard as its been really dry here so I thought just some water might attract them.

The other day I pre-moistened a hole like 10 minutes before I went to dig it for planting and found myself several worms that I transplanted into my raised bed. I am hoping the cardboard/bread gets me some more. I am guessing I should check in the morning or should I wait longer?

Go ahead and check it, you may get lucky, but I expect it might take the natives a couple days to locate the bounty you left for them.. Also, look around online for what earthworm cocoons look like, you may just start recognizing the cocoons in your own yard, especially in spring. I usually find at least a couple while I am out pulling weeds, or planting, and just drop them into one of my bins. My late grandfather grew/attracted his own worms in one of the windowwells right outside of his basement at his home in Ohio. Just tossed his eggshells and whatevers into the windowwell. I don't think he ever bought worms in his life. When we visited as kids and talked about buying worms, he just shook his head at the very idea, said "Follow me." and told us to dig into the windowwell. About 3 inches down, it was full of big fat worms.....

I've had most success finding compost worms ... in compost or manure piles, to a lesser extent under leaves; so those are the best places to check. That makes it easy enough to find significant enough quantities. It won't be just a few worms, when you find an active pile, they'll usually be almost swarming around something or other. Have also found in various other wet, dark spots like under logs and things like that, but never so much in quantity. So really a question of how long it may take them to get their numbers up. Personally I think no need to get peat moss at all.

Yep, I vote no to peat moss especially if you have to buy it. Use your money for the worms instead.

Here's my doubt about peat moss. Because of the colour, I really don't know if peat moss has broken down and became casting/compost. All it does is adding mass to VC.

I had leftover moss from when I had orchids, used in the medium and on the pots around the plant. I mixed it with juice pulp I left to rot for about a month or so and added to the worm bin. Yesterday was the 3rd time around of harvesting the worm bin that I found them still in long strands and quite recognizable. I am more convinced now that peat moss doesn't break down either. I mostly use corrugated cardboard and shredded newspaper for bedding. Leaf litter but only from my brother's persimmons tree because I know it will be "clean"

Tips on finding native worms, from the book "Let an Earthworm be your Garbage Man"

They may be [most] readily gathered by means of a lantern or flashlight, after dark, on almost any piece of well-fertilized sod, especially where there are a few large trees to furnish both leaves for food and shade from the summer sun. If a flashlight is used, it is well to subdue the light by covering the lens with tissue paper or a thin handkerchief, as the worms instantly withdraw into their burrows when too bright a light is flashed suddenly upon them, and not many creatures can move more quickly than a frightened earthworm. The best light for this purpose is fitted with a red glass, as red light will not alarm the worms.

In dry weather earthworms descend more deeply into the soil, and come to the surface in smaller numbers at night. At such times, indeed, they may seem to be entirely absent. Usually, however, it will be found that if the soil around their burrows is thoroughly wetted down by sprinkling with a garden hose shortly before sundown, the worms will come eagerly to the surface after dark, provided the night temperature does not fall much below 40 degrees. In case it is desired to obtain earthworms during cold
weather, they may usually be found by digging beneath compost heaps or
manure piles. Earthworms are hardy creatures, and a brief period of mild weather brings them to the surface even in February, in the latitude of Washington, D.C.