Science / Medicine : Ireland Under Attack by New Zealand Worms

Ireland has suffered a mysterious invasion from the other end of the Earth that threatens to do serious long-term damage. The invader, which has spread out across Northern Ireland and is now entering the Republic of Ireland, is a lowly New Zealand worm called Artiopositalthia triangulata, which is slowly wiping out the native population of Irish worms.

How the 6-inch-long New Zealand worm got to Ireland nobody knows. But it is thought that it probably arrived in Northern Ireland as egg capsules on the roots of a shrub more than 20 years ago. Since then it has proliferated in Northern Ireland and has recently been found on the southern side of the border.

The respected British journal The New Scientist reported recently, “Agricultural productivity in Northern Ireland could dip by at least one-third because a plague of flatworms has depleted the province’s population of native earthworms by 90%.”