What does it mean when blackworms are trying to get out?

[patrick]

I have my blackworms in a few plastic containers in my newt fridge so that they are only half an inch deep, and then I have about a half inch of water above them so that the overall water depth is about an inch. I rinse them out every day until the water is clear.

Sometimes when I go to rinse them there is a little trail of worms crawling up the side of the container. What does this mean? Should I rinse them more often?

 

[jennifer]

Mine do that too. I don't know what it means, it seems fairly random whether they climb or not.

 

[deborah]

I culture blackworms and usually when they start trying to get out, its a signal that there is about to be a mass die-off, so I do a thorough water change...

I don't keep mine refrigerated, though, because it prevents them from breeding. It's a bit harder to culture them outside of the fridge but I've been experimenting with various techniques for about two years, and have been culturing them successfully for some time now.

When they start crawling up the sides of the container I do a very thorough water-change, get rid of any that are dead or even slightly necrotic, and thoroughly scrub the container, bubbler, etc.

After that, I give them a fresh brown paper bag to munch on and they are usually fine.

Dunno if that helps. good luck with your blackworms!