Yes! I have totally done this. Only with the really big pots, though. Less than 1 gallon size and I worry about the worms getting dried out between waterings. Have you tried it with any smaller pots, and if so what were the results?? Do you feed them? I bury the occasional apple core or banana peel in there for them. Generally they are still there when I get around to repotting things.
Joel Salatin likes to point out that worms are basically magic:
"What I find most amazing about earthworms, and indeed what still baffles scientists, is that the castings that come out of the worms’ alimentary canals contain five times the nitrogen (N), seven times the phosphorus (P) and 11 times the potash (K) of the soil environment in which the worms live. It’s almost like alchemy because no net loss occurs."
Additionally, I have a recurring problem with fire ants colonizing one or two of my larger pots. It keeps them out of the wet, during the rainy season. I finally gave up on trying to evict them (I do not like to poison or even use DE on them, as anything bad for the ants is also bad for the roly-polies, millipedes, worms, etc), and instead, I deliberately feed them meat scraps... on the theory that fire ants are flesh-eaters, and that they move along from one nesting site to another when they reach a critical buildup of wastes. So I figure if I "enrich" their food supply, they'll reach that point faster, and move house on their own. I don't have scientific data on whether this shortens their tenancy or not, but the last couple colonies-in-inconvenient-locations did in fact move out not long after I fed them two or three times with the fat trimmings from a ham, and some cheese that the kids had dropped on the floor. Plants seemed fine through all of it, and may even have benefitted from the nitrogen boost.
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branchandroot
Re: Transplanting Worms
Date: 2024-06-01 06:37 pm (UTC)Joel Salatin likes to point out that worms are basically magic:
"What I find most amazing about earthworms, and indeed what still baffles scientists, is that the castings that come out of the worms’ alimentary canals contain five times the nitrogen (N), seven times the phosphorus (P) and 11 times the potash (K) of the soil environment in which the worms live. It’s almost like alchemy because no net loss occurs."
found here: https://www.motherearthnews.com/homesteading-and-livestock/benefits-of-earthworms-zm0z16amzbre/
Additionally, I have a recurring problem with fire ants colonizing one or two of my larger pots. It keeps them out of the wet, during the rainy season. I finally gave up on trying to evict them (I do not like to poison or even use DE on them, as anything bad for the ants is also bad for the roly-polies, millipedes, worms, etc), and instead, I deliberately feed them meat scraps... on the theory that fire ants are flesh-eaters, and that they move along from one nesting site to another when they reach a critical buildup of wastes. So I figure if I "enrich" their food supply, they'll reach that point faster, and move house on their own. I don't have scientific data on whether this shortens their tenancy or not, but the last couple colonies-in-inconvenient-locations did in fact move out not long after I fed them two or three times with the fat trimmings from a ham, and some cheese that the kids had dropped on the floor. Plants seemed fine through all of it, and may even have benefitted from the nitrogen boost.