Chopped Earthworm

[drobbyb]

I went fishing yesterday, taking advantage of the nice weather. We had about half a tin of earthworms left over so I took them home. I intend to chop them up and use as a treat for my rainbows. How would I go about doing it?

Anyone feed earthworms to your fish?

lol i think its funny that everyone here is so sympathetic to fish abuse yet they have no problem with chopping a live worm into several pieces. just sayin

Or a bacteria while we are at it. Can't be killing those.

 

[Honeythorn]

I kill worms very quickly. They do not suffer a slow death in any way. I have no problem killing something quickly in order to feed my fish free treats. Besides, most fish foods ( not algae tabs obviously ) contain....FISH. and crustaceans ,and all sorts of things that were once living. Would you suppose their deaths were quick? I'm willing to bet they were not.

Fish kept incorrectly in tanks that are too small/wrongly heated/un filtered/ ect ect however, do suffer, and quite horribly for relatively long periods of time in some cases. Take goldfish and bettas for example. Two of the most abused fish in the hobby without question.

 

[Syphoniera]

I'm with the worm-raisers posting above!
And they can be raised indoors in areas whre cold weather prevents outdoor compost bins from providing a year-round supply.
A very nice person on our local forum has given me some Red Wigglers to start a culture, and they're getting organically produced things like apple cores, banana peel, Spelt bread crusts, and the odd bit of porridge left over from making microworm cultures - so I know what they're being fed and that it includes as few chemicals as is reasonably possible.
I wouldn't have thought of raising earthworms as feeders before, but, with any luck, any remaining space between tanks can eventually be filled with worm and other live food cultures - and that ought to keep my mother the heck out of my room, lol.
It's such a nice, cheap, easy thing to do, that with luck will supply fish with nutritious snacks for a long time to come - not to mention innovative Halloween decorations come fall, almost guaranteed to reduce candy hand-out expenses and thereby increase money for fish stuff...

 

[MrNiceGuy]

I kill worms very quickly. They do not suffer a slow death in any way. I have no problem killing something quickly in order to feed my fish free treats.

Just out of curiosity, how do you go about killing them? I don't know much about worms but I hear you can cut them in half and they can actually heal into two seperate worms. This makes me think that they probably don't die as quickly as many would think. I don't want to sound like a worm-activist here lol, I just question whether people here really care about suffering or if they just care about fish suffering because they're infatuated with them and they think they're cute. Kinda like how so many people are against dog fighting yet they'll go out and eat a steak and chickenfingers.


With that said, you make a good point about long-term suffering as opposed to quick deaths. There is a major difference between the two.

 

[Honeythorn]

Chop it into small bits really quickly on the back of my hand with very sharp scissors before dropping into water. Not a method reccomended for the accident prone or clumsy. I mostly use the smaller slender worms, just a couple of inches long.

I tell you this for free, I have 3 worm icecubes. It takes a LOT of worms ( at the size I use ) to make just 3 cubes. But I don't need to use the whole cube, so I reckon I'll get about 6 treat feedings out of those 3.

 

[CKutz]

aw..
poor worms..
i used to go around picking them up off the sidewalks when it rained cause i knew the other kids would stomp on um.

i don't know if i could get into the routine of chopping them up haha, i'd feel bad every time..my fish would reallllyyy have to like them.

 

[Honeythorn]

If your fish really love bloodworms and other meaty foods then earthworms should prove equally popular. They're certainly cheaper ( by which I mean free of course ! )

 

[K-Holed]

If you cut a worm into two pieces, they don't grow into two new worms, this is a myth. Each half may continue to display signs of life for some time and the "head" end may live for some time, but they don't have magical powers to be split into two new creatures.

 

[Mikaila31]

I feed nightcrawlers to my caecilians, I usually just rip one in half and drop it in. I rinse off the dirt that is on them, but I'm not too concerned about the stuff in them. I squeze out mabey half of it. The fish defiantly like them, because they attack the broken ends. My caecilians will also only eat them from the broken end. If I don't break them, the caecilians just nose them around everywere, but won't eat them. They are kinda lazy like that......

 

[QuilliamUK]

Earth worms for tropical fish food.

How much worm would you feed them? I have 2 x clown loach (small), 2 x Zebra loach (small), 1 x Flying fox, 1 bristle nose catfish, 1x Royal ram and neons. Due to get more rams soon. At the moment they are on flakes and small pellets. They love small crushed snails but want to know how much worm to feed them. The loach seem to love live food.

Any ideas welcome.....

I have a Juwel- Rekord 120

Many thanks....Colin UK

 

[saltynay]

Its a treat food so say 2 times a week just chop up a worm quite finely and sprinkle around the tank so all the fish get some. 1 or 2 will do it doesn't really matter as its only a treat

 

[QuilliamUK]

I'll give it a go....new to this forum site so many thanks for your help....

I had to laugh reading some of the posts on here.

One I read was a female asking how she could get the worms from her garden without getting her hands dirty. It was suggested that she place HI-Fi speakers in her garden facing the ground and play trance music loudly as they are attracted to vibration. I couldn't resist it. I had to suggest other songs that could be played just incase the worms were'nt avid fans of trance music. She must have been blonde.....hahahaha

Colin UK

 

[umpsfar]

he he , poor wormies.
Its summer time again (almost), spiders, ants, midgits and other fly are on the increase.
Right outside my patio door i have lots of flies already swarming around each other in the sun.
Ive had the tank since early december and as much as i like spiders and remove them from the house,
i am not thrilled about the rest of the little buggers.
does anyone throw them in the tank?
Ive only got Gorami's n Angels.

 

[tqfan]

just came across this thread.

we've put a spider in the tank before, bloddy thing skated on the top of the water and climbed out the cable hole in the lid. had to actually submerse the thing on the second go... sure the knifefish ate it

my dad says the fish like ant eggs, this true? we've got a colony outside...

we also stick the earthworms in alive. they're usually for the knifefish, and cos it's so docile, we have to guide the worm to it's mouth, and it just sucks them right up. i found a HUGE worm last week when gardening, must have been about a foot long, and so quite a lot thicker than the smaller ones. i so wanted to chuck it in the tank, but didn't want the knifefish to choke to death, lmao. my dad was like, chop it up, but i thought that a bit strange. now that i've read this thread, i might go worm hunting tomorrow, hehehe

we do find it hard to actually find worms in our garden though. we did that trick of pouring soapy water on the grass, and then tapping the grass, no worms appeared...

anyone got any tips for finding them? sometimes have to dig huge holes to find only a couple!

 

[Bobtastic]

I'm pretty sure that I saw on one of the BBC's Spring Watch programs that the British Earthworm is on the decline... and now I find out why?! U buggers are feeding them all to your fishies!

Tho on a serious not, if they are on the decline it might be a better environmental idea to only use "farmed" worms if you can, to lesson any impact on the general wild population.

I don't think any of the fish I have atm would be overly interested in eating worms, but I shall certainly keep it in mind if I ever get any fish that prefer meatier snacks!