Darwin called these crea­tures the “ploughs of the earth”. Without worms we sim­ply wouldn’t have soil. Or food.

The Wormy Truth:

1. Every acre of soil can con­tain a mil­lion worms. You’re lucky if you have this many.
2. Nightcrawlers—the bur­row­ing worms—pull leaves down­ward into the soil as they eat them, aer­at­ing soil and leav­ing fer­tile castings—the worm poo we love.
3. Red Wigglers—the sur­face liv­ing worms—live on par­tially decom­posed organ­ics; they’re the ones used in home worm com­posters (ver­mi­com­post, if you want to get fancy). They can eat half their body weight in food every day. I bought a ver­mi­com­poster last year dur­ing the garbage strike, and all my tea bags and banana peels go there, instead of my city bin. Why should the city get all the good stuff?
4. Humus creation—the most impor­tant nat­ural chem­i­cal in soil—is one of the best upsides of worms. Humus lets plants absorb exist­ing soil nutri­ents and helps them with­stand drought. You can pour gal­lons fer­til­izer onto soil—not that I’m rec­om­mend­ing that!—but if there’s no humus, noth­ing will happen.

Best way to add more worms to your gar­den is to mulch with any­thing organic, leaves, com­post, grass clip­pings, even card­board. Make sure no bare soil is show­ing. It’s all food for the worms, who do the gar­den work for you while you sleep.

Related posts:

1. A Day in the Country is Worth a Month in Town
2. Ontario Food Heroes– Farmer