Not African night crawlers. These are much smaller. The key to culturing them, keep them under 90 degrees F, 32 d C. Too hot will kill them. Too cold will slow them down but not kill off a colony.

Get a shallow bin, if you want co culture them indoors. Outdoors, build a large wooden, brick or other type of frame as large as you want and up to 2 feet deep. Start the bin off with shredded newspaper, coconut coir or grass cutting but make sure they are dry and chemical free. You can also use shredded leaf litter. Next put food scraps in for them and let theme at them.

DO NOT ADD: eggs, dairy of any kind, meat, bones, or any other animal product. It is more about the fats than anything and they can ruin the whole culture very quickly and kill them all.

Be patient, I started one culture from worms I caught outside, less than 100 of them in a sweater box. It took 8 months to see any real population growth and another 5 months before I had a thriving colony. f you really want to see a lot of them quickly start with a good 2,000 to 5,000 of them for large bins. Large meaning 20-50 quart. Anything large and you may need more than that to get a larger enough colony going to feed off of a lot.

Mine right now are slowed down a lot. I have them in an unheated garage and they have pretty much stopped. For me it doesn't matter because I want their casting for fertilizer. I don't feed them off. If you want a steady supply you have to keep them between 70 and 85 F for faster production.

I will get a picture when I find my camera but they are nothing more than a plastic tub with a hole cut in the top with mesh hot glued over the hole and a dozen holes drilled about half way up. I also drill holes in the bottom to let out excess moisture. Any sitting water in the bottom will kill them causing an acidic environment.

Oh and if they are escaping then the bedding has something wrong with it or they need food. Mine do not try to leave at all unless their numbers have simply gotten way too high.