Worms don't like to be disturbed. OTOH, in a typical Rubbermaid tote system with paper bedding, the bedding at the bottom gets compacted and does not break down. What I suggest is to fluff the bedding as few times as possible to get the matted layer off of the bottom of the bin.

In my two-tray system, I fluff everything twice in a six-month cycle. I fluff everything once after about 2 months to break up the matted layer at the bottom of the bin. At about 3 months I add a second tray and begin the harvesting process, which takes another 3 months. About half way through the harvesting process, I fluff everything in the lower tray to break up the compacted VC at the bottom of the tray.

Other than that, the less you fluff the bedding, the more the worms will appreciate you.

When the bedding is mostly processed, I stop burying the food, and only feed on top. When I feed, I cover the new food with a layer of fresh bedding. I takes about a week for the fresh bedding to absorb the water form the food below it. At that time the food is mostly eaten, and I add another layer on top of the last layer of bedding. When it is time to harvest, I stop feeding for a week or two to encourage the worms to move up when the second tray is added.

On the other hand I say fluff the bin whenever you really want to know what is going on inside there. The more you fluff the more you know what is going on and the more educated you become about the goings on in your own bin. Ir probably disturbs the worms about as much as we are disruped multiple times every day. And worms are designed for disruptions that are not gentle peeks but attacks. And they are designed to survive. So in total disagreement with every other poster I say disturb them as much as you want, daily, hourly. You can't hurt them. (Please kindly avert your eyes and ignore that post about the one in two years I accidentally killed.)

Worms ain't engineering, they's ART.

I think they will grow better for some little old lady or man who loves them by peeking all around than will grow for an engineer who wants to be bothering them for calculations. It all depends upon who is doing the bothering and why. The worms know.

In spite of what I wrote above, I am just as bonkers as you two. I'm trying to cut back. But I do think that one good turning of the bedding to get the matted muck off the bottom is a good idea. It can be discouraging to harvest and find that 1/3 of what you thought was VC is a mat of wet paper.

Reading this thread made me think about my second bin. 32 gallon rubbermaid wasn't performing with 2,000 worms since last fall. So this morning I decided to fluff it. Glad I did. A few inches of good VC/castings on the bottom. Took that out and will harvest in a week. Looks like population doubled with a ton of eggs. I wouldn't recommend fluffing often, but I feel mine needed it. - Jim

Well, when looking to see if I needed to feed or not, I found what I think is fungus larva. Tomorrow I think I'm going to fluff the bed with some cardboard to allow for better aeration. I read an old post on her that said a nice layer of dry bedding on top helped from adult flies escaping and also they didn't like coffee so I'm going to try adding a bunch of UCG on top of the fluffed bedding and below the dry to see if that helps keep them away.

I have no idea what fungus larva are. But maybe you are in luck and have BSFL or Black Soilder Fly Larvae. They eat up all wet kitchen waste not just vegetable scraps. Multiple methods used at the same time are good for fruit flys. Actually use all you read about at the same time. It is WAR and you want to WIN.