RE: White worm culture

["Tranquility Base" <TranquilityBase at NetZero_Net>]

Hi Tricia,

You have mites. They compete with the worms for food. The more mites you
have the fewer worms you get. I have had grindle and red worm dirt cultures
without mites, but my white worm cultures always became infested. That was
one of the reasons I switched to synthetic. Mites do not live in synthetic
cultures.

Theoretically, you could seperate the worms from the culture with heat and
water. Put the soil in a screen cone. Heat from above with a 100 watt light
bulb the worms will drop out the bottom and into the water container below.
The worms sink the mites float. Take the worms only and start a new culture.
Destroy the original culture. If you live in a mite free environment you
will be mite free. On the other hand as your soil culture is the happiest
place in the world for mites, they will usually find their way back to it.
Fruit flies and yeast midges will also infest your culture.

To prevent reinfestation, take a plastic bag, cut a 1 inch hole into it.
Tape a piece of coffee filter over the hole. Keep the culture container in
the sealed bag.  This will keep things out.

Peace,

~RJ~

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-killietalk at aka_org [mailto:owner-killietalk at aka_org]On
Behalf Of Tish KB
Sent: Friday, November 01, 2002 12:33 AM
To: killietalk at aka_org
Subject: RE: White worm culture



> went well over 70 degrees. I know that the mites
> seemed to like it warm. ;^)
>

Ok well my culture is here, right now i just have a
small box (about half a foot square) with an inch or
so of moist peat w/ some baking soda to reduce
acidity, and dumped the culture on top... It was
packaged in a stryofoam cup with newspaper on top,
taped over except for a little air hole. Upon knocking
the dirt or whatever substrate the worms were in into
my peat moss, i noticed a lot of little bugs in there.
They look like teeny beetles, about 1/16th of an inch
big and brown in color... What are these? should i
worry about them? What about my setup-- will it be OK
or should i add some type of soil to it? should i mix
the culture dirt into the peat or just let it on top?
I have the box top (hinge style) closed for now,
should i poke a few holes in the top? thanks guy for
all your help, happy halloween too :)
--Tricia

__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
HotJobs - Search new jobs daily now
http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/
---------------
See http://www.aka.org/AKA/subkillietalk.html to unsubscribe
Join the AKA at http://www.aka.org/AKA/Applic.htm


---------------------------------------------
Introducing NetZero Long Distance
1st month Free!
Sign up today at: www.netzerolongdistance.com
---------------
See http://www.aka.org/AKA/subkillietalk.html to unsubscribe
Join the AKA at http://www.aka.org/AKA/Applic.htm