Susan's Female Crawlers

My most successful business was a worm business. I sold "Susan's Female Night Crawlers". I had some regular customers that stopped for fishing worms on their way to Strawberry Reservoir; some famous ones like Fireman Frank (surely you 50 somethings from Utah remember morning cartoons with Fireman Frank!); and lots and lots of drop ins. Everyone wanted to know how I knew my worms were female. I told them I turned them loose down mainstreet and the ones that went in and out of the stores were female. I let the males go on out of town. The females had a cuter wiggle.

Before the worms, I mowed lawns with my brother Phil. Believe it or not, I liked the worms better. This was not just my business. My name was on it but it was a family business. We watched Perry Mason after the 10:00 news on the days our friend's sheep pastures were irrigated. After Perry Mason was over, it was late enough to know the worms were out. It was great if there was a full moon. We could see the worms glistening in the moonlight halfway out of their holes. If you weren't quick enough, they'd be gone back down the hole in a flash. We hung our flashlights by a strap on our heads and carried a number 10 can with us to put them in after we caught them. Sometimes, you could get two at once if you were quick enough. The water was about an inch deep or less on the grass that had been nibbled down by grazing sheep that kept us company as we caught the worms. Only whispering was allowed besides the occasional bleat of a sheep.

We caught hundreds of worms a night. We kept them in a worm pit at our house and kept them cool with wet burlap. It was a great money earner at 20 cents a dozen at first then prices went up every year or so. We bought a tent trailer with our profits. It wasn't a fancy one but it was great fun camping in it.

The thing was, worming was ALL profit. We had only our labor to compensate. We used old vegetable cans we collected with wet peet moss in it to deliver the worms to the customers. They were nice and lively little squirmers. Phil loved to make the little kids scream by putting them on his tongue.