Worm Farming

An interesting thing happened while inspecting a redwood septic tank containing a Pirana at Thalia DeWolf's house. We pulled up the bacteria stick and it was crawling with juicy red worms. What a shocker! Real earthworms, not the strange vermiform critters you see in standard anaerobic septic tanks. More surprisingly, they were living down in the center of the Pirana - two feet under water. Earthworms don't live in water. So what is going on?

It makes sense if you think about it.

The key to the Pirana is its ability to keep soil bacteria alive in the septic tank. Inside the Pirana, we’ve been able to create a soil-like environment. The bacteria colonize the fixed film matrix while a foam-like airstream pulls water continuously up through the column. This was theoretical until we saw worms living down there. They were definite proof that we had created that "soil-like" environment. Earthworms know best.

Thalia's tank also has a tree root that likes the water and occasionally forms a mat at the surface of the tank. You can see that the worms have colonized this. There are literally thousands of them crawling through and about, flourishing on the rich bacterial food supply. This is not the only Pirana tank with earthworms. Another is a redwood cesspool at Joan Fontaine's house. The redwood tanks are more open to the surrounding soil than the concrete tanks, so the worms can get in. But they won't go until they want in.

Go worms!