European Nightcrawler VS. Red Wiggler

[Philminator]

I am buying worms in the next 2 or so days and want to know which is the safe type to feed and what is the one that is toxic to garters? here are my 2 choices below.


European Nightcrawlers (Eisenia hortensis) will consumer about 1/2 their body weight in food scraps per day. Maintain a ready supply for fishing and pet feed year round.


Red Wiggler Worms (Eisenia fetida)
Suitable for 1 person household. Will consume about 1/4 lb of table scraps per day.

[guidofatherof5]

I would suggest buying Canadian nightcrawlers. Some red worms are toxic to garter snakes. Canadian nightcrawlers are not. I just bought 500 very large Canadian crawlers, shipped to me for $54. I'm working on getting them wholesale from the source for $35, delivered to my door. Here's where I got mine Home - unclejerrysworms.com (http://unclejerrysworms.com/main.sc;jsessionid=4ED148375AC7E1FDDC14724086DDDB9 3.qscstrfrnt02)
He is a middle man and gets his mark-up. He gets the from DMF Bait Co.

[Philminator]

Ok I will look into it here is the website where I can get some worms, the benefit of her worms is that she is 5 minutes away from me!!
Results for Worms (http://www.capitalwormranch.com/servlet/the-Worms/Categories)

[Philminator]

I was also told with the 1/2 lb 250 worms that it comes with coco bedding or whatever she said and they will breed and I would never need to buy any worms ever again :)

[ssssnakeluvr]

red wigglers are toxic....not too sure on the other, but by looking at the scientific names...they are closely related....wouldn't use either.

[drache]

red wigglers are toxic to garters
there is also this company, offering yummy european night crawlers (based on snakes' response)
Earthworms from New York Worms: Earthworms (http://www.nyworms.com/earthworms.htm)
their care sheets and worm info are pretty good
I believe their prices include shipping

[GarterGeek]

Nightcrawlers are fine. Red wrigglers are toxic.

[Didymus20X6]

I would be cautious about the use of that particular species of "nightcrawler". They are not of the same genus as the Canadian nightcrawler (Lumbricus terrestris).

[Philminator]

I just got my european nightcrawlers tonight and they are tiny ity bity worms :( everywhere on the web they say they are the larger cousin to the red wiggler and not toxic but the thing is with the size of these worms It's gonna take like 20 to feed one garter snake for a few days grrrr. Canadian nightcrawlers can't be easily bred in captivity at all where as euro's are very easy to breed which is why I got them. Maybe the worms I got are all babies? something tells me I screwed myself.

[mtolypetsupply]

Phil, this might be a great time to get them onto pinky parts. Those little worms wriggle so well, much more than bigger chopped up worms. Dice up some pinkies, cut those baby worms in half, and give it a go. Or, throw in some fish filet in the "garter slop", with or without pink parts.

Hope your tiny worms are a blessing in disguise!

[OneEyedJake]

When I got my european nightcrawlers they were tiny too; I dug out about 2 feet of soil in 3 of my basement window wells and replaced it with shredded newspaper and peat moss and lightly layered in about 5-10 percent of the original soil; put in the european nightcrawlers and in about 8 months the wells were just full of adult and young worms. They do get plenty big enough for the garter and fishing. Somehow some frogs got into the wells and now I have several of them living happily there with all the food they could ever need. They fat.

[drache]

the european nightcrawlers I got from NY worms a couple of years ago were gigantic
I wonder whether the sizes vary seasonally, but I'm pretty sure I got them in fall

oooh oooh - just found something
Night Crawlers at Knutson's Live Bait - Live Canadian Night Crawler packages for fishing bait or pet feeding (http://www.knutsonlivebait.com/night_crawlers.html)

[Mommy2many]

Great site Rhea, Thanks!