🐛Earthworms 🐛

There are many types of worms. Some are harmful to man such as hook worm and tapeworm. Such worms will grow inside your body, robbing you of nutrition.

The common earthworms you find growing in soil is not harmful. They do a lot of good and improve the soil.

I started to write this post because of a POST ON SOIL by Mmk. Earthworms  improve the quality  of soil. The presence  of Earthworms  together with other organisms like nematodes is an indication  of a healthy biosystem in the soil.

The common species of earthworms  is known as the night crawler. They come to the surface at night and burrow into the ground during the day.

The burrows aerate the soil and also improve drainage.

 Earthworms  eat soil. After absorbing the nutrients from decaying matter in the soil eaten, the 🐛 pass out the soil as worm castings. 

You may have heard that compost (decomposed organic matter)  improve the quality of soil.

Worm castings which is worm poop is even better.

The digestive system of worms concentrates the organic and mineral constituents in the food they eat, so their casts are richer in available nutrients than the soil

Owing to its high organic matter content, it improves the soil's water retention capacity. Better nutrient absorption and root growth are promoted by it. Both the micro and macronutrients of the soil status are improved by its use.

There are people who purposely rear worms to produce worm castings.  The rearing of worms to produce worm castings  is known as Vermiculture. Besides the common earthworm, a species of worms , red wrigglers is  often used in Vermiculture.

Even though we may not use Vermiculture  to produce worm castings on a large scale, we can use Vermicomposting. 

Vermicomposting or using worms to speed up the composting process also produce better quality compost that contains worm castings. Whenever I see 🐛 when I collect leaves that have fallen down for a long time already, I will take the 🐛 as well.

Earthworms are hermaphrodites and posses both male and female sex organs. However the do not self fertilise but mate with another worm. They inject semen into one another. This exchange  of genetic material  is healthy.

Earthworms  can multiply quickly. However they are smart and will adjust the rate of reproduction to suit the environment they are in. If conditions  are right, each 🐛 can produce about 50 cocoons that gives around 200 worms per year.

Earthworms provide an excellent source of protein for fish, fowl and pigs but were also used traditionally for human consumption. 

Noke is a culinary term used by the Māori of New Zealand, and refers to earthworms which are considered delicacies for their chiefs.

Will you eat earthworms?

"Earthworms are a wriggling superfood. They're high in protein and have high levels of iron and of amino acids, which help break down food and repair body tissue. They also contain copper, manganese and zinc.10 Aug 2016https://www.npr.org› 2016/08/10"

If we eat enough of the superfood, can our tissues  self repair and regenerate like worms  can?

Source

Mmk's chickens are very smart. See what they can do in his post. Is eating superfood why they are so mart?