The bedding used for vermicomposting creates a very nice environment to raise fly larva, maggots, because it contains the food they like, decaying vegetative material, and the high moisture levels needed to support them. For those maggots present a light dusting of a desiccant, such as blood meal, can help and keeping the bin covered with a good window screen should be enough to keep the adult flies away so they do not lay more eggs.

Me the OP again. I'd be hesitant to use a mosquito dunk b/c of the worms and b/c I try to keep things organic (the compost gets used on my vegetable gardent). Here's what I did exactly - tumbled the compost as usual. Then I scattered some old sawdust over the top so that there was a thin layer everywhere - just enough so that you couldn't make out the veggie peels, etc. underneath. I imagine that dried leaves, straw, or even dried mulch would work as well.

Hi there MHERRON2213! It normally takes between 3-6 months for the worms to migrate and really should be a min of 3 months to allow as many of the eggs to hatch for the babies to move up. (assuming you are wanting to increase worm population) Ensure any larger or un-composted materials in the 1st bin are transferred to the 2nd bin along with a handful of the compost from the first bin. ( I've found this helps get the second bin started.) Also remember that it would take at least a week or 2 for the bin to inoculate before the worms would move up and then they will retreat after a feast for a bit until their new home is the way they like it, No matter how long you wait though, you will never have 100% migrate up. If waiting on cocoons to hatch is not a priority and you just want to transfer them to the next bin.. place the 1st bin on top of the 2nd bin and then shine a light over the top of it. Every 10 or so mins.. scrape away about an inch of the compost with your hands and the worms will keep going deeper and eventually into the new bin at the bottom.. This will only work if you have holes in the bottom of the 1st bin. If you don't have holes in the 1st bin.. place a garbage bag over the 2nd bin (just a single sheet of it) with several holes in it and then place several handfuls of compost on the bag at a time. Simply use the light method until you have scraped away all the compost.. the worms will then go through the holes in the bag and into the new bin. Takes approx 1 -2 hours depending on how long between scraping off of the compost. Hope this helps :)

A few weeks back I lost all my worms in my worm bin, which really stumped me because I had a flourishing and healthy worm bin that was thriving with hundreds of red wigglers in various stages of their lifecycle. I took a bit of a hiatus in feeding them as I was trying to maintain the level of mites I had in my bin (I basically wanted to keep it balanced). To be honest I don't know what might have happened, has anyone experience the same phenomenon? I don't think it was the mites as from most of the articles I have read they don't affect the worms and the population of them wasn't too out of control. Also when I looked through the bin to find any evidence of the worms there was still small amounts of food in the bin! Please help me on the famous worm disappearing act.