Can worms recycle hair?

by Stephan

Hi there!

Im David from Malaysia.

I have a small scale worm farm at my backyard and they are doing pretty well. Eating kitchen scraps and making good compost. I have been doing some reading lately, and stumbled across many articles stating that hair can be fed to worms. So I thought of asking you since you have much more experience than I do.

Does recycling hair have any benefits?
What do the worms need it for?
Would it increase yield like the eggshell grit would?

Appreciate any ideas and tips on this.

Thanks,
DAVID

Answer:

Hello David,

nice to hear from you. Good to know that your worms are doing well.

You raised an interesting topic and the short answer is "Yes worms can feed on hair and recycle it into nutrient rich worm castings. As a matter of fact I noticed that worms love hair.

Worms eat basically anything that is organic material. Hair is basically a protein filament (a long chain of proteins) and as such a good food source for your worms. Worms don't have teeth and can't feed on any material that is too big or hard for them to chew on. So hair being soft and elastic is an easy fed for worms providing them with lots of desired proteins for fast growth.

I wrote a short article about the subject a while ago. You will find it at:

https://www.worm-composting-help.com/human-hair-dog-hair-in-the-worm-bin.html

I feed any kind of hair I can get hold of to my worms. I regularly add Dog Hair, human hair and cat hair to my worm farms and found time and again that the worms love to recycle hair. The only thing you should keep in mind is not to feed worms with hair that has been covered with chemicals like Hair spray as that might be poisonous for the worms and could harm them.


Tell me a bit more about the eggshell grit you where writing about? I feed crushed eggshells to my worms as it acts as a pH buffer and adds valuable mineral to the worm castings but am not sure what you mean by eggshell grit?

Keep on recycling with earthworms!

Kind regards

Stephan Kloppert
Author of
"How to start a profitable worm business on a shoestring budget"
www.worm-composting-help.com

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Jan 22, 2020
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starstarstarstarstar 		Re: Mass worm escape
by: Stephan

Hello Paul,

I just replied to your message with the Title
"Treated dog hair". You should find the article in the main section of our website. Try to locate it using the internal search engine that you is located at the top right hand side of all our web pages.

kind regards

Stephan Kloppert

Author of "How to start profitable worm business on a shoestring budget"

Editor of www.worm-composting-help.com
Jan 19, 2020
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Mass worm escape
by: Paul

I have put some dog hair (along with some other items) in my worm farm and overnight I had my first mass escape of worms. I then remembered that my dog was treated with a monthly spot on Flea and Intestinal worm treatment (Advocate ) 26 days ago. Is this what is likely what is upsetting my worms.
Other items add were some frangipani flowers and some crushed (washed) sea shells
Jan 13, 2020
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Here the way i dry my eggshells,regards (This video clip is in Spanish)
by: Anonymous

https://youtu.be/E6qxoGsVUiU
Feb 03, 2019
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starstarstarstarstar 		Earthworm ratio
by: Dr Gautam Bhattacharjee

Hello May I know what is the ratio of earthworm and organic waste for better composting?
Best regards
Dr. Gautam Bhattacharjee
Apr 03, 2015
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starstarstarstarstar 		Re: Worms recycle hair
by: David

Hi Stephan,

Thank you for your speedy reply. Ive yet to try feeding them hair yet, but now that I know the science behind the hair I definitely would include that in their diet.
Thanks for the heads up. I had an idea of going around saloons and barbers to collect hair, now that i know it should be chemical free I'll have to be careful.

Would there be any problems with too much hair?

In regards to the eggshell grit I was talking about. I wanted to ask if hair had benefits, because I knew eggshells did have a few. Ive read some writings saying that the calcium from the shells would increase the worms reproduction. Is that true? Also may I ask, what other materials increases eggs production.

Best regards,
DAVID
Apr 03, 2015
Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		Re: Worms recycle hair
by: David

Hi Stephan,

Thank you for your speedy reply. Ive yet to try feeding them hair yet, but now that I know the science behind the hair I definitely would include that in their diet.
Thanks for the heads up. I had an idea of going around saloons and barbers to collect hair, now that i know it should be chemical free I'll have to be careful.

Would there be any problems with too much hair?

In regards to the eggshell grit I was talking about. I wanted to ask if hair had benefits, because I knew eggshells did have a few. Ive read some writings saying that the calcium from the shells would increase the worms reproduction. Is that true? Also may I ask, what other materials increases eggs production.

Best regards,
DAVID

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