The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1896-01-03
RAISING MEAL Wo RMS.

RAISING MEAL WO RMS.
A Profitable Industry That Perhaps
Affords a Puzzle for Naturalists.
(From the Denver Republican.
| A worm farm is one of the features in
store e. E. Achert runs at 1876 Seven
teenth street. Mr.. Achert and his wife
have been in the worm raising industry
in Denver for over twenty years; never
theless no account of their farm has yet
appeared in State agricultural reports.
This happened, perhaps, because it is the
only institution of it's kind in the coun.
try, and was overlooked on account Of its
novelty.
The worms are chiefly bred to furnish
food for hooking birds, and about 800
Denver people who own feathered mimics
of this variety are regular customers of
the Achert farm. Ali soft billed birds,
nightingales, thrushes, black birds, &C.,
eat the kind of worm the Acherts raise,
but there are not many of these birds in
Denver, SO the Achert farm provides deli
cacies almost solely and entirely for the
hooking bird tribe.
Although Mr.. and Mrs. Achert call
their worm plant farm, there is very
little of the agricultural about it It
looks more like a chiffonier than ranch,
Standing in the middle Of the little shop
Is large wooden cOntrivance, fitted out
with four drawers. Each drawer is filled
to the brim with moving. living mass
On the top Of each wigqling heap is a
heavy linen cloth. eaten through here and
there into holes. Out of neary every hole
just now sticks the brown head OF a
wriggling meal worm.
| AS explained by e. e. Achert, t he pro
cess of raising meal worms for the feed
OF soft-billed birds is quite complicated
business The history Of the Denver farm
is also interesting. 70 begin with, the
Acherts came to Denver twenty years ago.
bringing with them a pair of hooking
birds. In the old country feed for the
pets was easily obtained in the Touring
mills. They ate yellOwish worm, which
seems to generate and breed in grornd
meal, flour, and bran. After ri in ,
in America the Acherts could obtain nu.e
of these worms They did not seem to
grow here, and they, had hard time
keeping their birds alive, ignorant as
they were of what other food the mock
ing bird would eat.
1t happened that after couple Of
months stay in Denver, Mrs. Achert was
called back to Germany, and before leav-
| ing she WAS instructed by her husband
to bring back some meal worms for the
pair of hooking birds. In Frankfort she
purchased supply, and these formed the
nucleus OF the farm at 1916 Seventeenth
street. 500
| From the worms brought here by Mrs.
Achert numerous millions have since
been raised. The staple diet of the beasts
consists of beer, wooilen blankets. and
meal bran. Over the bottom of e,.eh
drawer is scattered mess of bran, in
which the meal bug lays it's eggs. Over
| the bran is laid a section Of thick WooIlen
blankets, above this more meal bran, and
over all heavy piece of linen. Between
the linen and the bottom of the drawer
an interesting process of evolution is 60
| ing on all the year round.
Where the evolutionary movement COM
mences is a question for abstruse, hair
splitting scientists, but in Achert's farm
it began with the worms After a lapse
of about three months these yellow, one
inch-Iong worm grew a hard shell of
brownish hue upon them and appeared
to be dead, Before coating themselves
with this armor they crawIed out of the
upper strata of the farm to the soft bran
at the BOTTOM of the drawer, and lay
tEoIe, hpparoAbiy WlGlOuI power or
motion. few weeks more, and each
shell burst, giving birth to an ugly black
bug of small dimensions, and possessed of
horns and feelers in plenty. These things
swarmed in the meal bran until they
nestled all over it ana laid eggs. AS fast
as bug laid her due quantity of eggs
she rolled over on her back and died. If
there are male meal worm bugs the
Acherts havonot become cognizant of the
fact: all their bugs Law eggs
During the Matching period, which lasts
about a month, there is no evidence of
life apparent on the worm farm. At the
end OF the mont1 the lower stratum of
bran crawls and quiyers with the life of
innumerable small worms These thrive
upon the bran, then eat their way
through the blankets into the second
layer of bran, and finally appear in a
Wriggling mass under the linen cover at
the top of tho drawer.
When this occurs their diet is varied
with an allowance of beer. Meal worms
fatten rapidly rpon lager beer. 1t is
sprinkled all over the linen cover until
that becomes saturated and the meal
under it becomes soaked. Beer fed
worms are raady for the market after a
fortnight's guzzling. They are sold by
the Acherts at the rate of 100 for IS cents
and 300 mocking birds are supplied with
daily food regularly throughout the year.
Zach bird eats from TWO to four worms a
day. so the feeding comes cheap.
About three-fourths of the worms raised
on thee Seventee nth street farm are sold.
the remainder being kept for breeding
purposes Whom worm grows pretty fat
ne crawls back to the bottom of the
drawer, and begins his metam orphosis
to a larva, then to a bug, then to an egg,
and back to a worm again. e. E. Achert
and his wife assert that theirs is the only
worm ranch in America,
heartily recommend Salvation Oil for