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The Guardian
29-03-2025
- Science
- The Guardian
Magnificent, rare worm with its own campaign song: the giant Gippsland earthworm
The giant Gippsland earthworm already has an upbeat campaign song. 'I am a real worm, I am an actual worm,' bangs the chorus of Doctor Worm, a late-90s novelty hit by the American indie rock band They Might Be Giants. Of course, Gippsland's worms definitely are giants – some reportedly stretching as long as 2 to 3 metres. And they are actually earthworms, albeit magnificent ones. Their size is truly remarkable, says Dr Beverley Van Praagh, a species specialist. A garden variety earthworm might be the length of your finger, whereas an average giant Gippsland earthworm is longer than an outstretched arm, its body as thick as a thumb. 'To be really honest, little worms kind of freak me out,' she reveals, 'they're all squiggly and squirmy.' These earthworms don't move like that, she says, they move slowly and gracefully. Yet despite their immense size, a song is needed, as you won't see these introverted invertebrates on the campaign trail, if at all. Giant Gippsland earthworms live underground in burrows, in small, isolated colonies scattered across 40,000 hectares (98,842 acres) in south-eastern Australia, and rarely come to the surface. Experts prefer not to dig them up, as doing so causes harm. 'There's an old rumour that if you cut a worm in half, you get two worms,' says Simon Hinkley, the collection manager of terrestrial invertebrates at Museums Victoria Research Institute. Don't even think about doing that with a Gippsland giant, he warns. 'If you cut a giant Gippsland worm in half, or even nick it, it's not going to survive.' Instead, scientists study the species by stomping about on the surface and listening for the sucking and gurgling of live worms squelching through their subterranean tunnels. 'The worm in the burrow gets a fright, and pulls back, retracts back down its burrow to go deeper,' Hinkley says, producing a sound like water draining from the bath. 'As far as we know, nothing else makes that sound.' Sign up to Down to Earth The planet's most important stories. Get all the week's environment news - the good, the bad and the essential after newsletter promotion These curious noises inspired an early 'talkie' in 1931 featuring the giant worms, filmed near the village of Loch in Gippsland, Victoria. The lead was a 6ft specimen, which lifted its head inquiringly for the camera, according to newspaper reports at the time. Seventy-five years later they starred again, alongside Sir David Attenborough in Life in the Undergrowth, who declared them 'one of the rarest and most extraordinary of all earthworms'. These giants have little need for such notoriety. These elusive animals seem to prefer a humble life, a colony of one or two worms might occupy a patch of suitably moist slope or creek bank as small as 10 square metres. Hinkley says: 'Everything about them is big and slow.' The Gippsland worm is thought to live to more than 10 years, possibly even 20, and produce only one amber-coloured egg cocoon each year, which emerges about 12 months later as a 20cm-long big baby. Patient, gentle and understated. If this sounds the perfect antidote to 2025, catch the earworm and cast your vote for the giant Gippsland earthworm. Between 24 March and 2 April, we are profiling a shortlist of 10 of the invertebrates chosen by readers and selected by our wildlife writers from more than 2,500 nominations. The voting for our 2025 invertebrate of the year will run from midday on Wednesday 2 April until midday on Friday 4 April, and the winner will be announced on Monday 7 April.
The Guardian
03-03-2025
- Science
- The Guardian
Mysterious and vulnerable: the secret lives of Australia's giant worms
One of the world's largest worms might escape notice, if not for the loud gurgling noises that can be heard coming from underground as the species burrows and squelches through its moist clay. The giant Gippsland earthworm, a purple and pink colossus that lives in a small, wet patch about 100km east of Melbourne in south-east Australia, reportedly stretches as long as 2 to 3 metres. These slow-moving and graceful giants, according to species specialist Dr Beverley Van Praagh, are quite unlike the 'squiggly and squirmy' garden variety, which Guardian readers crowned UK invertebrate of the year in 2024. Even an average sized individual would eclipse the UK's largest recorded specimen, a 40cm-long lob worm named Dave found in a Cheshire vegetable patch. Worm researchers such as Van Praagh say it is challenging to study an animal that lives underground, even one so immense. She said the main way to detect them was to stomp about on the surface, and listen out for the distinctive sound – like water draining from a bath – of a startled worm retracting deeper underground. Sometimes researchers look for evidence of burrows, complex tunnels with rippled sides, according to Simon Hinkley, the collection manager of terrestrial invertebrates at the Museums Victoria Research Institute. They might find a cocoon, shaped like a cocktail sausage, where the worms laid a single egg that produced one large baby – about 20cm long – after a year. Egg cocoons were a beautiful amber colour, he said. 'And if you hold them up to the light, you can actually see there's one worm inside.' Sorry your browser does not support audio - but you can download here and listen $ Extreme care has to be taken when digging, as these are vulnerable creatures. If you accidentally nick a giant worm it bleeds, and is unlikely to survive, Hinkley says. Anecdotal accounts describe 'horrific' scenes of fields running 'red with blood' when the worm's habitat was first cleared and ploughed. The gentle giants remain in small, isolated colonies, but as a long-lived species that produce few young, and continue to be threatened by changes to the water table, soil disturbance and excavation. Dr Pat Hutchings, a senior fellow at the Australian Museum, said Australia had a huge diversity of worms, including many endemic species and several giants found on land, in sand and under the sea. Hutchings specialises in sea worms, known as polychaetes. She described one large specimen, measuring at least 1 metre long, found in sediments under shallow waters about 180km north of Sydney. The species was named Eunice dharastii after the fisheries scientist Dr Dave Harasti, who managed to entice the iridescent worm out of its underwater tube by dangling an offering of fish head over the burrow. Hutchings said another sea worm species, found in the Kimberley region of northern Australia, was long enough to be slung around her neck like a feather boa. Hutchings said even though worms might be gathered together as one group of animals, they were incredibly diverse in their forms, behaviour and reproductive strategies. 'We've got this amazing biodiversity in Australia,' she said, including thousands of worm species. There just weren't enough worm scientists yet to describe them. The Guardian is asking readers to nominate species for the second annual invertebrate of the year competition. Read more about it and make your suggestions here or via the form below. You can tell us which species you would like to nominate by filling in the form below. Please include as much detail as possible. Your contact details are helpful so we can contact you for more information. They will only be seen by the Guardian. Your contact details are helpful so we can contact you for more information. They will only be seen by the Guardian.
