What is Your Worm Doubling Time?

by Dale Robinson
(Lawton, OK)

Doubling times can be a little evasive at times. You can do some math about how many cocoons with so many eggs a worm will produce. We can also include the length of time through each part of the life cycle. Most of us will never see the results of such a calculated process because we don't provide the worms with the ideal conditions or the grow room to continue with those conditions.

If you start out with nothing but adult worms then one might get a little discouraged at the progress of the growth of worms in the bin. The adults don't grow much and the new cocoons have to mature and hatch before they start to contribute to the visual growth of the worms.

I think most of us would rather know the doubling time of the weight of our worms rather than some unattainable calculations.

A way to determine mass doubling times(MDT) is to sample a measured area several times to see how much weight has been gained. Once you have used this method a few times you can usually guess fairly close without doing the actual measurements. . To achieve the most even MDT's it is desirable to start with bed run worms. If cocoons are not included then the new bed needs to mature to where new cocoons start to hatch. Otherwise, the measurements will not include the continuous supply of new worms.

So, what is your estimated MDT?
what system do you use?
What worms do you grow?

My MDT is about 8 - 12 days with the Worm Tea Factory system and Alabama Jumpers.

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