Invasive worms?

21 years ago

I recently posted a thread on this forum and the answer I recieved got me to thinking about native worm species. I "googled" the subject with the following key words: "worms", "native" & "US" and the results I got amazed me! Here are just three of the results that came up: http://www.ovpr.uga.edu/researchnews/95su/worms.html, http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/invasives/terrestrialanimals/earthworms/index.html & http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/01/0102_030102_earthworms.html. I grew up in Minnesota, (which two of these articles concern), and earthworms and nightcrawlers were always a part of my young life. I'm not trying to pick a fight, but what do other forum members think of this "controversy"?

Thanks,

Mike

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Comments (5)

chuckiebtoo
21 years ago
What controversy?

Chuckiebtoo
huachuma
Original Author
21 years ago
Chuckiebtoo,

Sorry if I was vague; I guess I should have said "issue". Are worms truly bad for some ecosystems, such as the previously glaciated hardwood forests mentioned? I'd had personally never heard of such a thing; everything opinion I've ever encountered was that worms were good for soil with no caveats... The Minnesota Dept. of Natural Resources seems to have an strong opinion on the subject, (I used to do field work with them in the mid 80's). Or is this an overstated threat to native plant species. (BTW, I did a search of previous posts to this forum using the keyword "invasive" with zero results).

Regards,

Mike
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Kelly_Slocum
21 years ago
Mike, check out this thread on the Soil, Compost and Mulch forum:
http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/soil/msg031636485508.html?27

Kelly S
huachuma
Original Author
21 years ago
Kelly,

Sorry, I didn't want to rehash a subject that was so recently aired! I didn't realize from the general subject line that it went so in depth about this issue. But, thanks for the link; alot of good info! On the subject of the "curly" worms that rizzir mentioned; I may have seen them also! But when I looked at them very closely, they more resembled giant planaria, (from the flatworm family). They had the same arrow-shaped head with two eyespots, but because they were up to 6" long the head wasn't as obvious. I've only seen them when the soil in my yard is very saturated and they do look a lot like sickly, skinny earthworms, (kind of like those left in their bait containers for much too long).

Mike ;)
rizzir
21 years ago
Hi,

My green worms were correctly ID'd by Kelly as Allolobophora chlorotica, the common green worm, which is originally from Eurasia. It is definitely an Oligochaete, not a Planaria (eewwwwwww, I can't stand worms that are not of the earthworm variety - they gross me out!) It is found in the subsoil, not the topsoil, as it feeds on the nutrients that have filtered down into the subsoil and wouldn't live in nutrient-rich soil. It also prefers wettish conditions. It may be the host of the Cluster Fly larvae, but I am questioning that - hopefully Kelly will see my question and answer it. I learned all this from doing Google searches on the species.

-Regina (rizzir)