After retiring from a job where he made his living from the air, Bill Clark is enjoying his “retirement” at a much lower elevation—starting a worm casting business in Gloucester.

Clark, who retired recently after 32 years as an air traffic controller, now operates Moose Hill Worm Farm on Roaring Springs Road, about a quarter of a mile from the main entrance to Beaverdam Park. Partners in the business are his wife, Barbara, their daughter Robin, and Carolyn Fetter, all of Gloucester.

The partners purchased African night crawlers, a type of earthworm, Clark said, and they sort and package the worm castings, or as he described it “worm poop,” as a soil amendment that’s nutrient-rich.

At present, they have about 9,000 worms, Clark said, and plan eventually to have several hundred thousand worms all contributing to the soil enhancer that they sell at several farmers’ markets in the region. The worm product is also available at several retail locations on the Middle Peninsula and Peninsula, including Brent and Becky’s Bulbs in Gloucester, and Pure Harvest Market at White Marsh.

Of course they don’t plan to buy most of the worms, Clark said, as they gather the worm eggs to have a constant stream of worm castings in dozens of plastic containers in a shed near their residence. The shed is heated to protect the worms.

“Earthworm castings are a wonder product of nature,” a Moose Hill brochure said. They are “an all-purpose natural fertilizer that come to you straight from nature with no alternations.”

The worm castings “contain rich proportions of water soluble nutrients,” the brochure said. The castings “allow plants to quickly and easily absorb all essential nutrients and trace elements.”

The Clarks have lived in Gloucester since 1997.