Garden

Worm Fun Facts!

• A worm has no arms, legs or eyes.
• There are about 2,700 different kinds of earthworms.
• Worms live where there is food, moisture, oxygen and a favorable temperature. If they don’t have these things, they go somewhere else.
• In one acre of land, there can be more than a million earthworms.
• The largest earthworm ever found was in South Africa and measured 22 feet from its nose to the tip of its tail.
• Worms tunnel deeply in the soil and bring subsoil closer to the surface mixing it with the topsoil. Slime, a secretion of earthworms, contains nitrogen. Nitrogen is an important nutrient for plants. The sticky slime helps to hold clusters of soil particles together in formations called aggregates.
• Charles Darwin spent 39 years studying earthworms more than 100 years ago.
• Worms are cold-blooded animals.
• Earthworms can regrow parts of themselves!
• They hatch from cocoons smaller than a grain of rice.
• The Australian Gippsland Earthworm grows to 12 feet long and can weigh 1-1/2 pounds.
• Even though worms don’t have eyes, they can sense light, especially at their anterior (front end). They move away from light and will become paralyzed if exposed to light for too long (approximately one hour).
• If a worm’s skin dries out, it will die.
• Each worm is both male and female.
• Worms can eat their weight each day.