5 Types of Worms in Potted Plants That You Should Know About

Potted plants have different types of variables, including their shape, size, and natural territory. However, potted plants attract the worms to their soil. You might be thinking of the “worms” as very beneficial creatures. Do you know those worms can cause depredation to your plants? In this guide, we shall talk about the types of worms in potted plants. You’ll be explained the worms and worm-like insects that have an existence in your potted plants. Let’s have a look below!

What you’re going to find in this guide? 

• 5 Types of Worms in Potted Plants
• How to Get Rid of Worms in Potted Plants?
• FAQs about Potted Plants!  

In short, if you see a worm’s presence in a large garden, don’t be exhausted but happy! The worms are beneficial to plants and provide nutrients to the plants by aerating the soil. I am talking about the common earthworm even though experts say that cutworms and composting worms bring success to the plants.

• Earthworms

Once discussing the types of worms, I feel start talking about ‘Earthworms’ firstly. Usually, these brownish-red worms are very familiar with us and found beside the pond or in our fields’ garden or soil. If you have potted plants, you will find them there. 

The Earthworms are known as the fastest fertilizer producers. They are plant-friendly and are there to fertile soil quality naturally by decomposing the productive with organic materials. The following worms’ specialty can burrow up to a deep hole inside the soil and prefer to fertilize the soil entirely. 

But, this worm can leave your plants heavily infested by eating the soil and leave partial to leaves. Maximum people ask us if the Earthworms have any harmful effects on nature! Our answer to this question is ‘Yes.’ Heavy earthworms invade, lead the soil erosion, leaching of nutrients, and damage the fish habitat as a maximum of earthworms go through forests’ productivity. Indeed, it is a nice option to keep the worms in potted plants temporarily. It helps proper fertilization.

FAQs of Earthworms:

• Do earthworms damage plants? 

No need to worry about that! The earthworms don’t harm the live plant or leaf but improve the soil for healthy plant growth. It is fair to harvest worms in potted plants for a short period, ensuring proper nutrition. You need a bit of knowledge about potted plants if the soil is enriched with a few earthworms. If the ground is with low nutrition, it means you’ll find no earthworms there! An advanced solution to the potted plants can be added with grass clippings, chopped leaves, and semi-decomposed compost. It will enrich your soil shortly. 

• Should you put worms in potted plants? 

You can do it if you feel necessary to maintain soil structure and easy plant growth with the worms. The earthworms leave the soil organically rich with a lot of nutrients. Why not grow your plants faster and healthier? Technically, it is wise to use worms in potted plants. 

• Can worms adjust with the potted plants?

Do you know? Our research says that a few earthworms bring quite benefits in potted plant soil. It is a misconception that earthworms eat the living plants and harm the plant parts. It is not valid. The earthworms eat the decomposing bacteria and fungi only and improve the live roots with massive growth.

• Compost worm

Have you heard about compost worms before? You are lucky if you have compost worms in your garden soil. Unfortunately, I haven’t found it in my potted plant soil. However, I have seen them in a laboratory and read about their benefits and eat harmful bacteria, protozoa, and fungi from the soil and lead your plants to have more nutrition. How to find them anyway? Mostly, the compost worm is found in the raw compost. They never harm little green plants ever.

There are types of worms found for composting the soil, and red wigglers are very proficient for the work. You can think of red worms. They are also recommended for vermicomposting. These species of worms can create an aesthetic compost environment where you will be benefited from bare soil. You can easily keep the red wiggler worms in potted plants and let them spadework in your soil for a little while. 

The lifespan of the compost worms is estimated at 24 months in the worm bin. The surprising news is that a worm is created with 90% water. They’ll die and shrivel up. You won’t notice it! Even their dead body will become part of the compost. Isn’t it lovely?

FAQs of Compost worms:

• How long can red wiggler work without food?

You must provide a food source to the bin as the red wiggler worms work great with energy. You should not leave them unattended, or they’ll die around the third week. However, their food source can be rotted leaves, vegetable scraps, fruit skins, and coffee grounds. 

• What’s the reason wiggler worms die? 

The thing to survive red wiggler worms has moisture inside the potted plant soil. It does not mean you’ll put the worms in too much moisture. It is harmful to them also. Don’t keep the worms in excessive or too short air circulation. Keep the plant pots with readymade air holes, and it will cause the proper worm oxygen.

• What’s the proper temperature of the compost worms? 

The appropriate temperature for the compost worms is between 55° and 75° Fahrenheit. Do not harm your plants and these worms with extreme heat or extreme cold. Maintaining proper temperatures will help the worms with real reproduction speed and feeding demand. Then, you’ll get the worm’s breeding cycle within 27 days. The appropriate temperature is important to double the compost worms population every two months.  

• Grub Worms

Here, we come with the ‘Grub Worms.’ The worms create an infestation in your potted plants easily. But do you know? They’re not very beneficial for your plants but harmful. What do the Grub Worms look like anyway? The worm has a ‘Larvae’ stage of Christmas Beetle, African Beetle, and Scarab Beetle. 

The worms start living on micro-organic materials and eat the plant roots along with the baby worms. If you see eggs 1-5 inches under the ground, remove the mother worms from there right away. 

FAQs of Grub Worms:

• Is the ‘Grub Worm’ Good?

Not actually! These types of worms bring harm to potted plants. Even though most of the plants are damaged with grub worms, they are not affected by the beans or peas. Here we good with a few crucial harms are done with the plants through these worms. 

The ‘Grub Worm’ loves eating the root of a plant and leaving your plant dead. Besides, little plants can’t have proper growth and nutrition through the infestation of the Grub Worms. Having grub worms will give you extra pain! You have to remove the entire soil and then transfer the plants to another pot.

• What do they look like? 

These Grub Worms are mostly structured in a whitish, plumpy body with size within 2-3 centimeters. You will get them in a ‘C’ form structure. Grub Worms have their six legs. 

• How to get rid of these grub worms?

You can easily choose these worms as the grub worms are whitish. Sometimes, you’ll find them 1-5 inches under the soil, or you’ll see the grub worms living inside the leaf! I have got them besides the root. By god, they were eating my plant’s root entirely. You should remove the worms physically.  

• Cutworms and Millipedes

It must be funny! We call it ‘vegetarian worm.’ What do they look like? These worms are like a black bug and are created with hundreds of legs. You’ll see the Millipedes crawling on the leaves or under the container plants. 

The nature of the worms is much more neutral. The worms are not harmful and work hard to maintain the soil during wet nature. You rarely can see the Millipedes in the dry and cool outdoors. 

What are the features of these Millipedes? 

The worms have a blackish-brown color outside their body. As far as my experience, I have seen the Millipedes with cylindrical body shape. They feel comfortable to stay rounded. The worms’ body shape is 1″ long, and they are blessed with a segmented body. It is fun to see them in the form of a spiral coil. 

Talking about nature, Millipedes loves to be in a humid environment. They love to be wet! In the day time, you won’t see the worms available even under the soil. However, they come out at night and hide under leaves. 

The potted plants encourage the millipedes to stay with their ‘too moist’ environment. You are planting trees on the lawn, right? Then, you’ll see these arthropods soon inside the container soil.

FAQs of Cutworms and Millipedes

• How to identify cutworms and millipedes in my potted plants?

These millipedes have several species, and specific type of millipede get angry if they’re disturbed during the mate. Then, they curl up the leaves and roots out of anger. However, if I talk about the millipede’s damage and how their damage looks, I must say it’s like having some brown spots, black stripes, and some soil hues.

• Plant-parasitic Nematodes

The worms live beside the plant’s roots to eat the root system of your plants. Would you love leaving these worms in your potted plants and lead your plants to heavy destruction? One of the main things is the ‘Plant-parasitic Nematodes’ is quite different from the other small worms. Not only roots but also the step, foliage, and flowers are affected by this worm. However, not all nematodes are harmful to plants. We had research on ‘Bacterial feeding nematodes’ and ‘Fungal Feeding nematodes.’ These worms have a non-segmented body structure. The body size is estimated at 1/20 inches as usual. 

FAQs of ‘Plant-parasitic Nematodes:’

• What are the prevalent nematodes in food preferences? 

In agricultural soil, the ‘Bacterial feeder’ is seen. If you’re a farmer or being on a lawn, you can see them. Besides, ‘Fungal feeder’ is one of the popular nematodes to live on fungi like ‘Plant parasites.’ They are dangerous for plants. The rest of the nematodes is named ‘Predator.’ 

• What’s the good story about ‘Plant-Parasitic Nematodes’ worms?

Not these worms will benefit your plants! If you are relatively assured of the bacterial and fungal nematodes, then read the benefits mentioned below. 

The fungal nematodes play inside the soil and bring nutrients into the soil through the inorganic form. The nematodes help to rejuvenate bacterial colonies in the soil. 

• The dark side of plant-parasitic nematodes:

These types of nematodes are harmful to the plant if cultivated in the group. You’ll get your plants to pierce and penetrate the roots. Besides, the nematodes damage the root tissue that restricts the plant’s growth massively.

Conclusion

In this guide, we have tried telling you about 5 Types of Worms in Potted Plants. Have you enjoyed reading us? However, most worms are non-harming for the potted plants, although the ‘Plant-parasitic Nematodes’ can gradually eat your plant by the roots. You’re requested to change the soil, separate the worms away, and get shifted to new pots. It is natural to be in touch with any worm-like creature in your garden or potted plants. You can use Earthworms and beneficial nematodes for the better growth of your plants and environment. Thanks for being with us!