A shovel of soil is WAY too much! But from your description, that does not seem to be your problem. Some worms just take a while to acclimate to a new home. Besides the soil, which should not be causing your worms to run, everything else you describe seems OK.

Leave a light on over the bin for a few nights. That will encourage the worms to stay put until they get used to their new home.

Even with perfect conditions, you'll experience some worms that try to explore when first introduced to a new bin. I have a clip light that I attach to the edge of the bin that I turn on at night. That keeps the roaming down until they get settled in. I use a clip light simply to save energy. I use an LED bulb in there so it doesn't heat up the bin too much and uses a fraction of the power. I've also thought about using a string of white LED xmas lights glued to the lid but haven't tried that yet. Easier solution is just to move the bin to an area where there is a light you can leave on at night.

Now if you've got more than a handful trying to escape it's probably something about the bin. I'd wager that almost always, it's due to too much moisture. Easy way to tell is do the worms trying to escape feel super wet and really slimy? If you do have a wet bin, add some dry bedding and leave the lid off. That combined with the light should help. It might take more than a week or two with the light to make sure they are settled.

What do you do when you remove the lid and find a bunch of worms goofing off on the inside of the lid? Do you flick them back into the bin and tell them to get to work or do you just replace the lid and leave them there. I have been doing the former.

Dave Nelson

I definitely scold them. I have no tolerance for worms goofing off.

If that doesn't work, I call them into the office and go over their job description with them.

:-)

karchita .... waaaaait a minute, there ... do these little guys have their union rep with them when you haul them into the office?......

Nope. And they don't have a leg to stand on.

Hey karchita! you may want to make sure they don't dig their seate in! Could pull rug fibers out. A real revolt could result in the rug being pulled out from under you.

I made sure my new worms were very clear on what is required of them when I put them in their box to work. ;)

Seems that was just a one time thing. There were so many outside the box the first morning I knew I would be having to buy more-but I put them all back inside and so far no more have tried to leave. It must have been some sort of exploration thing.

Thanks for the tips!

I have 3 can-o-worms towers going. I cleverly numbered them 1,2,3, so I could tell them apart. #2 is the one where the worms like to hang out on the inside of the lid. I have simply been giving them a scolding and flick them back into the bin, but this last time I took a closer look and was about 6 newborns. About like a piece of thread half an inch long, so I decided to leave well enough alone. The worms seem to come and as they please, so,live and let live.

Dave Nelson