Coming up for air: the toils of being an earthworm

Earthworms in Flanders are particularly hard hit by heavy rains. In Dutch, they’re even known as regenwormen – rain worms – probably because they come out of the ground when it rains. They’re coming to the surface now to get oxygen, explained professor Bart Muys of the University of Leuven last week.

“Earthworms breathe through their skin,” he told De Standaard. “If their underground passageways fill up with water, they have to come to the surface. And there’s another reason they come up: they migrate in search of a mate.”

But coming to the surface has a major disadvantage: It makes them vulnerable to prey. And getting out is a lot easier than getting back in if, for example, they’ve strayed onto a paved surface.

Professor Muys isn’t surprised the worms have come to the attention of farmers. “You can easily find 300,000 worms in one hectare,” he said. “Imagine if one in five of them were to die – that’s a lot of worms.”

The soggy conditions are perfect, however, for mosquitoes to lay their eggs. With all that water lying on open ground, from farms to festival campsites, it looks like a plague of mozzies is on the way. Chin up, though: So is better weather.

Photo courtesy Dorling Kindersley