When folks around Lincoln County head fishing during the summer,a stop at Papa Brady’s Worm Farm is a must for some.

Over 35,000 catalpa worms have been picked at the farm thissummer, said owner James Brady, who believes the small black andyellow worms are the best fish bait.

Brady said he became fascinated with the worms at the age of 16while on a fishing trip on the Homochitto River.

“I kept hearing the fish striking around the bend, so I wentover there and a catalpa tree was leaning over the river, and wormswere falling off into the river,” he recalled.

Brady decided to try the effectiveness of a few worms on hisfishing hook and found it very beneficial.

“I brought home a big string of catfish, and from then on I washooked on catalpa worms,” said Brady, who is an avid fisherman.

The next day he began his own collection of catalpa trees in hisbackyard, and has continued to add trees for over 35 years.

“Now I’ve got about 2,400 trees, and my goal is to be able topick 100,000 worms a year,” he said.

The catalpa worms get their name from the trees they live onbecause they are exclusive to catalpa trees, said Brady.

“That’s the only trees they’ll grow on,” he said. “They willactually starve before they’ll eat any other type of trees.”

Brady has learned much about catalpa worms from his ownresearch, which he has conducted over the years because he saidvery little information was available on catalpa worms.

He has discovered many things about the worms, such as how themain predators and pests are lady bugs, wasps and birds. He hasalso studied the life cycle of catalpa worms.

“The adult, fully-grown worm goes into the ground. . . and theycome out like a gray moth,” explained Brady. “They lay eggs on thebottom side of the leaves, and it starts a new cycle.”

Brady added that it usually takes around three weeks after theeggs hatch for the worms to become large enough to pick off thetrees. He has to be careful and wear protective gloves when pickingthe worms because of the acid-like fluid catalpa worms secrete as adefense mechanism.

The worms usually begin appearing in April and last until themiddle of June every year. Brady said he is kept busy supplying theworms for seven cents a piece to his customers.

Brady, who recently retired with 34 years of service with theUnited States Department of Agriculture Rural Development, hasfound his worm farm to be the perfect retirement hobby. Other thanthe busy two-month period of picking worms, Brady finds the upkeepof the farm very easy.

“You just have to keep it mowed (around the trees), and you haveto keep the fire ants controlled because they’re real bad aboutgetting the worms,” he said, adding that the limbs also must be cutback every winter because the trees grow extremely fast.