Garden 23 Jun 2005 01:16 pm
worm convention
A zillion tiny, active worms appeared on one of our garden beds yesterday. They’re roughly a millimeter long, they seem to be segmented, and they like to get together in clumps at locally high spots in the compost.
Josh took some photos. Then he went inside and scratched at himself all evening, sure that he’d gotten nearly-invisible worms all over himself.
on 23 Jun 2005 at 1:29 pm 1.Amare said …
Do you think they might’ve been nematodes?
on 23 Jun 2005 at 1:38 pm 2.Cam Sculpin said …
That was my first thought, but nematodes are unsegmented, and these sure look segmented from what I can see of them. I wish I’d put a few in a jar and found a microscope with which to observe them. They’ve gone as mysteriously as they arrived.
on 23 Jun 2005 at 1:41 pm 3.Josh said …
There are still (or were when I left, anyway) some around the base of the rocks, if you want to scrape any into a jar for observation. I’m not sure where we’d find a microscope, though.
on 23 Jun 2005 at 1:43 pm 4.Josh said …
Hey, and here are instructions for extracing nematodes from soil samples: http://www.barc.usda.gov/psi/nem/what-nem.htm
on 23 Jun 2005 at 1:46 pm 5.Cam Sculpin said …
I bet the folks at Science Art and More would let us use one. And there might be a low-power one at the Center for Urban Horticulture.
(PS: still itching?)