pH plays an important role in many things in life from milk, brewing beer to gardening and swimming pools. The pH scale is actually the measurement of hydrogen ions concentration. The more hydrogen ions, the more acidic a material is.
Understanding the pH Scale:
pH reading of 7 is neutral and is in the middle of the scale of 0 to 14.
Anything from 0 to 6 would be low, however is actually high in acid. OK, don’t ask me to make sense out of this, as I did not create the scale 
Anything from 8 through 14 on the pH scale is high as the alkaline level is high!
Confused yet???
Just remember, 0 – 6, acidic = low, 8 – 14, alkaline = high, while 7 is neutral 
Many people assume the pH meter is linear such as a thermometer, hence they believe a pH level of 6 is very close to a pH level of 7. Nothing could be further from the truth.
The pH scale is logarithmic. Without all the mathematical explanations and simply put, a soil with a pH level of 6 is ten times more acidic than a pH level of 7.
For your worm bin the ideal pH level is 6.5 and can vary slightly, more towards the neutral zone of 7.
To raise the pH, being it is too acidic, 0 – 6, you can use agricultural lime or other alkaline material; however this takes a bit of time to level the pH. Another trick is to use hardwood ash. Since this is powdery, it acts very quickly, however a little goes a long way so do not over mix!
In order to lower your pH level, 8 – 14, in your worm bin, you will need to add acid based material. You can add peat moss, hardwood sawdust or some fresh spent coffee grounds.
To maintain a neutral pH balance in your worm bin, finely crushed eggshells will do the trick as well as keep expenses down.
Reducing the Acidic Level of Peat Moss:
Soaking peat moss will NOT reduce the acidic level as many websites offering worms would have you believe. If we could balance the pH simply by adding water we would all have perfectly balanced pH flower beds, gardens and yards after watering ;-)
Peat moss by itself is acidic as low as 3.0 on the pH scale and should be neutralized prior to adding to a worm bin. The way to reduce the acid level in peat moss is to apply one of the above mentioned, preferably hardwood ash as it is quick acting. The best method is to add a little in with the dry peat moss and mix thoroughly prior to adding water for soaking. Turn the soaking peat moss a couple times a day to insure that the alkaline material used is dispersed evenly.
Why Peat Moss Needs to Be Soaked For 48 Hours:
Soaking peat moss for 48 hours is required due to the nature of the peat moss. It acts as a sponge in slow motion, some fibers absorbing the water quicker than other fibers. If you soak for less than the 48 hour recommended time period, your bedding will begin to dry out rapidly and be difficult to moisten to the correct level of 70% to 75% moisture content.
This will occur as the result of not all the peat moss having time to absorb moisture, hence sharing the existing moisture throughout. The dry peat moss fibers will absorb some of the moisture from the wet peat moss fibers hence drying out the wet fibers, eventually leaving all fibers shy of the correct moisture content.
Well there you have it, a short lesson in pH levels as well as why you need to soak peat moss prior to adding to your worm bin!
Good Luck in Your Vermiculture Adventures
Bruce Galle
Hi Bruce,
First of all I love your newsletter, thank you. When you speak of hardwood ash are you talking about using sawdust? I just redid my bins with Peat moss, as I have always done, and now all of a sudden they don’t seem to like it and try to escape. I did your newspaper trick and that was great advice. Also, is it because the temps are colder now that my worms don’t seem to eat as much? I have them in my kitchen. They used to need feeding the chow every other day now it’s only twice a week maybe thrice.
Irene,
Thanks for the compliment on the newsletter. I try to make them informative as well as useful.
As to hardwood ash I am referring to the ashes from burnt hardwoods. In hindsight I guess I did not make that clear since there is an ash tree also., Hmm, blame it on human error
Yes, if the temperature drops enough, the worms become less active and eat less as well. If you can, try placing then next to the heat register in the floor or wall where they will get additional heating while the heater is running. Of course, do not block the register off as we would not want you to sacrifice warmth for your worms!
Hope that helps,
Bruce
I want to begin mass producing vermiculture and worms. Is there a company that will sign a contract to purchase all i produce at a wholesale price. Also, is there a company that will provide equipment to a farmer that has land and buildings? I’ve heard of a place in Wisconsin. Are there any other companies you can tell me about?
Brandon
Before you get ahead of the horse, first you need to produce your worms, worm castings…
If someone becomes a potential buyer, they will most likely want samples for themselves to look at as well as might want samples of worm castings to send to a lab…
A worm farm is not an overnight setup. Take for instance our African Nightcrawlers. These worms at 6″ to 8″ are eight months old or so. Now other worms mature and grow faster as they are smaller. Take the red wiggler for example. You could be selling bed run stock with mature worms within three months rather than waiting eight months.
If you locate a buyer, you will need to be able to supply a steady commitment of so many pounds of worms, castings… per week, month or whatever your agreement is. In short, you need to establish your worm farm before trying to locate a buyer…
There are numerous places that you can purchase equipment. You can Google “commercial vermiculture equipment”.
As for a company setting you up, be careful of the fine print and what they are expecting of you. Remember if something sounds to good to be true, it probably is.
A suggestion would be to start out small with a few types of worms. Try different bin structures and find what works best for your needs. Decide if you are looking to sell worms, castings, cocoons… or all the aforementioned. Which type of worm(s) are you going to sell? Make sure you get your system down as it is much less costly to lose 50 or 100 pounds of worms than to lose an entire farm of a few tons of worms
Start selling locally and online from your own website. Establish yourself and expand from there.
If you take the time now, you will be much happier you did down the road!
Hope this helps,
Bruce
I just got into my compost ben and got out some of that rich looking compost that I thought would go good mixed in with my worm bedding. I did put some of my old oranges and grapfrut in it. I had read that it could be done if lime was added with the citrus. I put my meter in it and it doesn’t even regester, (below 6 on my meter). I mixed in some more lime but that will probably take a while. In your artical you said to use hardwood ash would lower the ph the fastest. Would any hardwood ash work, like the ash form citrs, or maybe mesqite.
Thanks
George from AZ.
George
This is the main problem with information online. There is a good amount of misinformation out there. Some is given by those that do not even raise worms. Both mesquite and citrus woods I would avoid. You would be better using the ash from maple, poplar, walnut… for pH leveling.
Lime will work over time. Be sure to use a powder type listed as agricultural. For a quicker acting method, try using some hardwood (non citrus:-) ash from a fireplace…
My advise at this point would be to first off dampen some shredded newspaper and place approximately 1″ or so thick in a five gallon bucket or something similar. Pull out your worms and place them on top of the dampen newspaper. They will climb through hence giving them a rinse… Worm Wash
Then create a new bedding for them after thoroughly rinsing the worm bin.
If you do this, you most likely will save most if not all your worms from either dieing off in the bin or escaping it to only die on the floor…
Bruce
First off, I must say, great blog site, very informative. But I do have a question about ph levels. I have been trying to start a worm farm business for @ a year, started with euros but now doing african nightcrawlers, the local fisherman just love them. I have not had any problems with ph level until recently as i have noticed a dramatic decrease in my worm population i changed bedding a couple of weeks ago and finally check ph levels . ph very high. 7.5-8, dont understand why, but do know it is affecting my worms. short of rebedding what can be done to make it more acidic. I feed coffee grounds, crushed corn and alfalfa seeds, as well as food scraps, have always been able to keep 6-7 ph range. any help would be fantastic, thanx for any advice Hillbilly Willy
Hillbilly Willy
Catchy user name
First try reducing the Alfalfa seeds. This might be a problem with pH but also very high in protein which will affect worms as they are protein sensitive, especially the African nightcrawlers.
You could add some damp sphagnum peat moss as this comes a little on the acidic level as well as continue with the coffee grounds.
Bruce