Attack of the killer worms?

I agree with you greenbrain that Equil is a generous and friendly host here. She is quite knowledgeable in all her area of expertise even with a whole busy life at home with her children. She is always a source of challenging ideas of many issues here on Daves. I too appreciate you Equil. Steve.

I consider Equil a mentor. A bit zaney, perhaps a touch clumsy, but a mentor nonetheless.

Let me be the first to let you know Snapple that I haven't broken anything this year (not even a rib), I haven't sprained anything (not even an ankle), I haven't knocked myself out, no black eyes or technicolor bruises, and I haven't cut a finger off. Come to think of it, I haven't done a face plant this year either. Couple of Downy Hawthorn thorns have gone through my flip flops and into my foot but those pull out easily enough. Lemme see here, I'm pulling off quite a few ticks but I've gotten them all in the crawling stages! I feel it in my bones that it's going to be a good year. How about you?

I was out planting on and off all day and this thread kept cracking me up. There I was digging away with my usual Sterilite shoebox that I fill with worms and every time I tossed one in the box I couldn't help but smirk because I kept getting this disgusting visual of Alsatian Smothered Worms on a dinner plate! Think about it. They wouldn't exactly be White Castle sliders now would they!

I don't know what to say about the mentor or host thing. Were you to compare my experiences to any one of the local land stewards, biologists, or ecologists in this area; you'd be sorely disappointed. Now ideas and concepts that challenge, I'll take credit for literally "digging" many of those up!

I just found this thread and think I'll add my $0.25.

Earthworms are great in veggie gardens, no doubt, but they are something you do not want in your potted plants. A nice well-draining peat/bark mix can turn into soppy mud after the worms have their way. This is not good for plants that do not like poorly aerated, heavy wet soils, which many of my plants are.

As far as worms loose in the forests is concerned, I would urge those concerned to see if the forests in question are virgin forests (i.e. never been cut down, farmed on, cleared, or anything else). It is my understanding that so-called "invasive" species cannot invade a pristine or undisturbed ecosystem, only those that have been disrupted from their natural state.

I still find it hard to see how an organism native to Earth can "invade" Earth!! Plants and animals have moved around this planet from one biome to another for many thousands of years.

Hi LariAnn, Tough to swallow for me that exotic earthworms can be so disruptive outside the confines of our veggie gardens. You might be interested in reading Forest Dynamics and Disturbance Regimes by Lee Frelich however Cindy Hale also has some really great primary research available.

Invasive species can and do invade "pristine" and "undisturbed" ecosystems. Happens all the time. I have a property up north that would be about as close as one can get to pristine but... birds migrate over the area depositing seeds of invasive species in ready made fertlilzer packs and many other factors contribute to why it is that I have to be on the look out for invasive species in an area where I can't even see my nearest neighbor. It happens, that's why many of these species get labeled as invasive.

I like snapple’s contribution to this thread-
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/p.php?pid=3460357

Interesting. Never thought they could be a problem. So where are all the early birds?

Ah Victor, some of your comments always crack me up. I once saw a robin trying to scarf down one of those humongous non-native night crawlers. It was pretty funny. The robin didn't succeed. Maybe we need bigger robins?

And of course this begs the question of what on earth the natives used as bait when they fished! You've opened up a can of...

I don't understand your question this time.

Native Americans.

You were joking again and I didn't catch. Pretty funny... bait v. no bait. I believe Native Americans (prior to European colonialization) practiced many different forms of "fishing" but this is probably an area that Gloria could deal with in her sleep. Depends on which tribe but some used traps, some used spears, and some used nets. Some used combinations and I'm sure some out there had to be using bait.

I almost speared one of my koi by accident but that's a long story. The cold ending was that I fell into it in mid-December. Brrrr.

Glad I'm not the only one joking called "Graceful".

Maybe they used Catalpa Spinx Moth caterpillars, they're supposed to be the best for fishing from what I've read.

If that's our Common Earthworm Lumbricus terrestris you're mentioning, American Robins should be able to deal with them no problem, our Blackbirds (close relative, same size) deals with them easily.

Resin

I dunno. I've read that caterpillars have been used as bait. Maybe I read it here but nobody who fishes around here uses caterpillars as bait.

For the most part where I garden, there are no native earthworms. When I garden and come across a worm there is no thought process involved to me tossing it up onto the driveway for birds to eat. I run across some of your European Lumbricus terrestris and they get at least 10" long. I've seen the robin nesting in my fruit tree abandon one particularly large worm but I'be also seen other robins struggling with some really huge worms. I don't know that they'll choke yet I don't know that they won't choke so I do now cut the largest ones I come across in half before tossing them up on the driveway.

When it rains around here, worms surface. Sometimes we gather up what we find and toss them into a kiddie pool for raccooons. Many of those worms escape the kiddie pool.

I can take some photos of some of the really huge worms I run across this summer and maybe we can play the "name the worm" game.

Say Victor, you've been writing articles for DG. What about you digging in and writing a three part series on exotic earthworms in the US?

Funny you say that. When it was recently announced that they will be increasing the number of articles per day, I joked that I was going to do an 85 part series on the earthworm! I think someone is working on a worm one and believe one on vermiculture was already done. I used to throw them into my pond when the koi were alive.

Ha ha ha! An 85 part series on exotic earthworms should just about cover all the issues but then again... maybe not. I think, not positive, that this entire thread may be hyperlinked and that everyone in it is going to be "well read".

Here's something for you to sink your teeth into and it's not believed to be introduced-
http://palouseprairie.org/invertebrates/palouseworm.html
Scroll down to the image of the 'lil critter. Too bad it was chopped in half by a shovel.

Cool! I'd love to put that under my wife's pillow.

I suppose with all the snakes stuck in my face over the years by silly little boys trying to get a rise out of me that a big old white earthworm under my pillow wouldn't be enough to make me lose any sleep. Sort of glad I'm not your wife though. You must keep that poor woman on her toes!

Save a Robin from choking, kill a worm. LOL. I never knew worms were such a hot topic.

"worm huggers", LOL. That's the best comment.
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I'm going to be on the lookout for new and innovative ways to manage exotic earthworms while I plug along restoring my property-
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I would love to hear how that works out for you. LOL. " Slowly but surely I stalk my foe, I will not rest untill their destruction.".

Hehe. Go get'um.

It's been a real long time since a then new member, greenbrain, started this thread hyperlinking to an article she found titled "Attack of the killer worms". Sensational title, ya probably but exotic earthworms are irrefutably doing some damage and the science to back it up is out there for the taking just as it is for stray cats decimating songbird populations. There have actually been articles titled "Attack of the killer cats" that people mocked until they realized exactly how much damage exotic cats were doing. Come to think of it there have also been articles titled "Attack of the killer vines" written about exotic Kudzu and "Attack of the killer ants" written about exotic fire ants so why not earthworms? Seems as if we are learning lots of exotic species can do an incredible amount of damage if left unmanaged. If you are truly interested in what I found that I'm rigging up to work for me to get the exotic worms to surface, I'd be happy to share same with you.

I happen to live where fire ants have moved in. They are a pest. Kudzu is around here and that is very invasive. The cats are also a problem on Hilton Head Is. Really there is nothing that kills them so they just keep having more cats.

We also had a beetle come in through the port in Savannah which killed most of the bay trees around here in a year flat. No one could figure out what was killing the bay trees but you saw dead ones in any and all wild areas. That was freaky how fast that happened.

As far as the worms I have no idea how you could possible kill them off.

This message was edited Jan 15, 2008 10:51 AM

Ah, poor you- fire ants. Fire ants aren't only a pest though, they're an invasive species just like kudzu however fire ants are sort of hard to ignore once they've moved in therefore most people are emotionally willing to label them as an invasive. Unfortunately, not generally so with cats or deer for that matter. As the years go by, more people begin to become open to the "science" behind that which brands a species as invasive or not. Perhaps your personal experience with Xyleborus glabratus (Ambrosia Beetle) helped you become more receptive to the concept that not all beetles may be created equal and therefore not all worms may be created equal but what ever did it, it's a good thing because public awareness is being heightened.

I doubt the technology is out there to kill off the exotic worms and it may never be. Best we can hope for is to manage them to reduce their impact and try our best to keep them from being introduced to areas where they currently don't exist. Vermicomposters are being warned not to let their charges escape and many are taking the warning seriously. Some bait stores are passing out little flyers warning fisherman not to toss out left over bait. Little steps. Most of my property is woodlands. I, like many other folk out there, am a shade gardener and I garden in a region where there are no native species of worms. This is really important because no matter what worm I run across while out and about, it's going to be exotic so I have no qualms offering it to the birds or the raccoons. In other words, I don't have to worry about proper IDs because they're all introduced here. I've tried the mustard, not the hot Chinese referenced above by Snapple but bulk dry powdered mustard from Sam's Club. Seemed to me any yellow mustard was fine- 1/3 C to a gallon pour half wait 5 minutes then pour the other half because it takes time for some worms to respond. Again, there was a cost component to that. I found apple cider vinegar worked almost as well as mustard and was considerably cheaper but I darn near had to pour it on in a ratio of 1:6 and was getting concerned about my soil pH. That left me with memories of having read somewhere that a little gas powered generator on a dolly had been used to bring them to the surface. Talked to my husband about it since we have a little generator on a dolly and he said it was definitely doable and that he didn't even think we'd need high amperage to get them to surface. All you do is stick the electrodes in the ground at 5 minute intervals and the electrical current brings them up to the surface within about 15-20 minutes. We're going to experiment with this a little bit more this year because we've been experiencing droughts and because I've got a lot of trilliums and other woodland species out there. Other than that, night crawlers aren't called night crawlers for no good reason so they're pretty easy to collect if you're out at night and anytime the soil is saturated on a really rainy day many worms are brought to the surface.

For you, little tougher because you're in SC. There are some indigenous species of worms there and anyone in the south should familiarize him/herself with which worms to waste and which worms to toss back if that's the route they choose to take. I don't think I'd launch a campaign to go out and "get um" down south because the problem is too new and more research is necessary. I think if I was down south I'd simply waste any that I was able to readily recognize as being exotic while running across them when gardening or when it rains. No sense going out of one's way to get them right now until more is learned. If you gather up samples of the types of worms you have on your property, you could send them off to that Cindy Hale mentioned above and I bet she'd take the time to identify them for you. The other person you could probably contact for IDs would be Paul F. Hendrix. I'm told he's a very helpful person too although I've never dealt with him before.

It's really encouraging that some people take a minute to consider their actions on the environment since our history is one of showing disregard for plants, animals, and other humans when they haven't progressed our personal wealth.

AAAHHHH Equil, Your xenophobia is heart worming:-) Where do you get all of the time to research all of this stuff? I want to spend it gardening - not killing. I do enjoy your inquisitiveness. greenbrain, just remember, the link they provide you will only support their position. It's still fun to read - sometimes it's educational. Good gardening - fear diversity. LOL

Like most, I delve into issues that affect me and I am gardening here in a woodland setting. There was a heck of a lot of European Buckthorn here that definitely needed to be killed off or it was going to be gridlock in my woodland garden. Think of Buckthorn as the Kudzu of the north. Those who are struggling with a lot of European Buckthorn might want to take a closer look at its relationship with European earthworms. A heritage biologist for my state first introduced me to the earthworm issues when visiting my property to provide technical assistance. He provided me with some very basic literature. I recall standing there and about all that came out of my mouth was "No way". We've all grown up being told all worms are good, myself included. I try my best to avoid prejudicism by examining facts to the best of my ability by reading what I can readily get my hands on and experimenting on my own property when possible. Some really great facts on exotic earthworms are out there for the taking thanks in part to some extremely dedicated people doing some really great research.

Equil, I understand. I've just been struggling with theinvasive plants issue, now I gotta be concerned about worms? It's getting a bit tiring. Guess I'm just gettin' old. Wish you well and energy for the long term.

Good thing you understand because I'm not understanding all these complex relationships as they pertain to me all that well any longer. Frustrating would be an understatement. It gets to the point where you don't know what to go for first. The Buckthorn had to go. What a bramble that crap was when it was interlaced with that JH and Multiflora rosa. At least I can move around out there these days and I get to play in the dirt doing some fun gardening like others.

For me, I think I've really gotta do something about the worms if I can but take into consideration where I'm gardening too. For that CoreHHI down in SC, I don't know that it's all that necessary for her/him to go out of her/his way to do anything. They simply haven't shared enough of the issues with us to enable us to make educated decisions for our own properties yet. I suspect we'll learn a lot more in the next ten years. I've just discovered they've got lesson plans out there for elementary grade students, master naturalists, and master gardeners. Take a look at this extremely comprehensive lesson plan that is out for grades 4-12:
http://www.google.com/search?q=kbs.msu.edu/k12/resources/documents/worm_activity_lesson_plan_v3.doc&rls=com.microsoft:en-us&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&startIndex=&startPage=1
Just click on standards addressed for the HTML. They sure didn't waste any time creating lesson plans in an attempt to disseminate this "earth shattering" exotic worm research did they?

MSU (Michigan State - not Mississippi State) is a leader in this type of environmental studies/horticultural education plans. We've used them in our Junior Master Gardener programs. I used to take online courses from them in gardening related subjects, but they out sourced them, and I lost touch. Interesting stuff, as long as it is taught in a benign way. We don't need more of "The sky is falling" approach. I still believe in long term universal solutions. My Chinese studies convinced me many years ago of the validity of Yin and Yang. For every action there is somewhere a reaction. Positive/Negative. Getting a bit too philosophical for a gardening discussion forum. My apologies. Gardening the best I can is still the best I can do.

At the end of a gardening day, there must be at least sastisfaction. The very best days bring tranquility and great pleasure. Anything less makes it just a chore.

Nice touch.

I had not unwatched this thread. When these recent posts popped up, I had not only forgotten about this thread, but that I'm the one that started it.

How to get rid of worms? Drown them. We lose worms here in the American Bottoms everytime there's a major flood. After the 1993 flood, worms (a popular fishing bait) were scarce in this area. If the land didn't flood, the water table was so high that the ground became so saturated that many plants drowned; along with the worms.

We need to introduce taxation on worm populations. That will drive them away and make them unproductive and ineffective to the soil. Tax the buggers!

Wouldn't work . . . it would just drive them underground

;-)

That is good Resin. But that is the point. No worm can compete with others deep in the stratification. Tax the buggers. Tee Hee
Speaking of worms: Knowing that the early bird gets the worm I have always taken the perspective of the worm and every day I sleep in.

This message was edited Jan 18, 2008 9:28 AM

Wish I could find a screen shot from the movie Dune.

What was the movie "Dune" about? Was it the wormie equivalent of Alfred Hitchcock's "The Birds"? Are like worms dropping from the skies and oozing out of the woodwork and slithering into our brains or something?

They had giant sand worms that they rode.

Hey greenbrain, this thing has legs - oooops, do worms have legs? This is one nutty thread. It's really been fun. Equil, you are special.
A fan.

Oh, now there's a pleasant thought. Worms so large we could saddle them up and ride them. Seems like the stuff nightmares are made of. I do see possibilities here though- a single Dune Worm could go a long way feeding the hungry. One worm like what you described could stop the tummies rumbling of an entire city block of Chicago. Alsatian smothered worms for everyone!