Say Anything Blog

HAPPY WORM

WELLINGTON (AFP) - The New Zealand inventor of a worm-driven composting toilet has flushed away concerns from bureaucrats that the system traumatized the wriggly creatures, local media reported Sunday.

Sounds like a promising alternative in certain situations. Well, it does until, you get the you know who involved

Coll Bell, who built the “wormorator” as an alternative to septic tanks, was asked to get an expert’s report on its mental impact on the tiger worms after an official became concerned during a site visit, the Sunday Star Times said.

Ok, I admit, I do actually feel bad if I happen to chop a worm in half while digging in the garden ... but trust me when I say, I had no idea that there are beings on earth who are concerned about the psychological well being of a WORM!

“She felt that the worms were being unfairly treated, being expected to deal with human feces, and that it could affect them in a psychological way,” Bell told the newspaper.
“I said, ‘Well, what do I do about that?’ and she said, ‘You have to have someone with the necessary qualifications to say the worms are happy’.”

Right about now, I’m probably not the only one imagining a worm lying on a couch talking to a shrink ... lol, I didn’t think so.

In Bell’s invention, a colony of worms filters solids from the toilet waste and the leftover water is filtered into underground trenches.

The Auckland Regional Council’s concerns went down the pan after vermiculture consultant Patricia Naidu found the worms in excellent health and breeding happily.

A council spokeswoman told the newspaper the worm worries were justified because the system was going to be used at a campground, where sewage flowed heavily for two weeks each year, with little during the rest of the year.

What more could we possibly ask for than reassurance that crap eatin’ worms are as happy as ... I don’t know, as noncrap eatin’ worms?