I think worms are a great addition, I am gonna try to farm them to get their casings and the compost they create. They are easy to do.

Power Composting. You did good. I have spent the last few falls and springs trying to do Power Composting, but I've never gotten 121 bags. I figure if I do a few years of Dedicated (I just learned a new term for compostables)Feedstock Gathering, I can relax a bit. Do you have enough to bag up for leaf mold? I always keep about 20 bags hidden in the woods. Do you not have worms in the places where you've been applying leaves as a mulch? Leaf mulching generally draw worms for me. If I had never seen a worm in any of my areas that had been amended for a year or more, I'd consider bringing in some outside help. I remember my father "seeding" our new lawn when I was a kid with huge nightcrawlers which he released into the new loam in the cool darkness of night, expecting them to be safely burrowed in by morning. Not so. We awoke at dawn to the screams of a flock of ecstatic robins. It was a feeding frenzy! I never have worms in a working pile. They come when the compost is finishing off (even red wrigglers), waiting for me to come and get it. I've never seen a worm in a hot pile. If I were bringing in worms, I'd put them in the gardens, not the compost. They do a wonderful job, as you know, of working and fertilizing the soil. Worm bins, which don't heat up, are a great way to raise your own garden worms. That's my primary reason to keep a worm bin. To raise them for the garden. I only feed them "feedstock" to keep them alive, until I release them in the spring.

Welcome Aussie from Oz! I have only limited experience, but that experience is in Alaska, so I am 'sensitive' to temperature issues with worms. As sbryce pointed out, the PRIMARY issue is really just TIME. Even at an ideal temp of 70F/21C, I would expect it to take monthS - PLURAL - for "things" to get "cooking" worm-wise in your bins. (My bins are at 72F and it was AT LEAST 3 months before they started showing signs of "increase".) I have found that reported "doubling" times AND how much compost worms - like Eisenia fetida - eat per unit time are GREATLY exaggerated by those who would part one from one's money. "Keep on truckin' " as we used to say in the '60s when we were encouraging people to stick with something. I have only one 'thing' to add: others with far more experience than I recommend "LEAVE THEM ALONE". I would add my limited-experience voice to theirs in that recommendation. Paul

Sbryce nailed it on the head with number three. Eisenia Fetida will thrive in Michigan in a good layer of organic matter. One reason they are sometimes favored over others for composting is that they propagate so prolifically in comparison. Well, there is a good chance their breeding rate is to facilitate survival of the species. . . or rather they have survived because of their breeding rate. Whichever evolutionary school of thought you adhere to. Either way, their short lifespan due to sensitivity to cold is compensated for by heavy breeding. The cocoons will survive the winter. The worms will survive the summer heat if you provide them what they need. If you have a regular compost bin or windrow the worms will find you. I live in central Indiana and dug my first round of wigglers from a manure spread at a wood line. The manure wasn't purposely inoculated. I also have them in my regular compost bins outside. They dwell at the edges when the compost is hot and they tend to dig in to it well when it cools or when winter hits. Again, I don't inoculate it with worms. In other words, I am not raising those worms on purpose. My raised garden beds have wigglers. I did inoculate those, though, and do so every time I add castings. As I say when teaching about raised beds: The goal is not to have a raised garden bed. The goal is to have a worm bin you can plant things in. Keep the worms fed with plenty of good compost and maintain good moisture so they will stick around. Insulate them in winter with leaves so they survive a little longer to break some leaves down. Their offspring will take over where they left off in spring. Of course, if you add cocoons in spring from an indoor compost bin, you will have a much higher number of worms for the summer months. I've read, though I haven't verified, that worms don't adapt well when moved from an indoor bin to an outdoor bed. That's including worm farms that have experimented with moving worms to outdoor, in ground worm beds. It's supposedly best to just get the worms to breed in propagating bins and spread cocoons when you spread the castings.