I've had red worm beds in the past and worms will eat most any kind of garbage from the kitchen plus newspapers, weeds, etc.
I'm not keeping worm beds right now since I now have dogs that will also get into them, eat the garbage plus the worms.
The worm count in my soil is good though since I don't use anything but organic here.
Have lots of moles and that is another story. And dogs dig deep holes going after them; makes it difficult to mow.
I was Google-ing the history of pesticides, but couldn't find the articles I was seeking.
Pesticides became more common after WWII and the original use was to exterminate humans.
Then someone got an award for finding small amounts would also kill bugs, but not humans (at least immediately).
So much of history has become sanitized.
