Catching Night Crawlers

Mmmm, tasty. This little spot will go along with another full page and half page for a magazine story revolving around catching night crawlers. I was excited to take on the project for sentimental reasons. For several summers when I was growing up, my brothers, my father and I would catch night crawlers to tell to fishermen (and to fish with ourselves). On the nights when we would flood irrigate my grandma's yard, the worms would come out in droves to get air and escape the soggy ground. With flashlight in hand, we would sneak up on the stretched out critters and grab them before they could slink back underground, sometimes catching more than one in a single snatch. The contest was always on to see who could capture the most and we kept strict numbers. There were countless nights in which we individually caught ten dozen worms or more. In our back yard we built an underground worm corral. it had a mesh screen bottom so they would not burrow their way out. We filled it with peat moss, kept it damp and fed the worms a little cornmeal from time to time to keep them fat and happy.Our customers loved to buy our chubby night crawlers and we were happy to take their cash. Can't remember how much money we made. I'm sure it wasn't that much, but it was our money and we were proud of it.