Jessica Fugard was having fun with a lazy day in her yard backyard in St. Thomas, Ont., when she observed one thing out of the bizarre.
It was a flat, slimy worm, with a crescent-shaped head, that gave the impression to be consuming a part of a snail.
“I began poking it with my nail and thought, ‘This appears to be like attention-grabbing,’ so I took an image of it, and Googled it,” stated Fugard.
“After that, I used to be like, ‘OK, let’s not contact that.'”
Because it seems, the strange-looking invertebrate was a hammerhead worm, identified in scientific communities as a bipalium — a predatory, poisonous flatworm that is invasive to North America.
“I used to be actually excited, really. I’ve at all times been fascinated by bugs and worms. I used to be already joking with my brother that I’d get my 5 minutes of fame over a worm — like all my accumulating of bugs and worms and stuff as a child lastly paid off,” Fugard stated.
When Fugard posted a two-second video of the worm wriggling on a brick on a neighborhood gardening Fb group, it amassed virtually 1,000 shares and dozens of feedback from locals, some urging her to report the discovering to conservation officers.
That is precisely what she did, she stated, including she despatched images and knowledge to invasive species specialists.
“I do not know what they’ll do transferring ahead, as a result of I actually don’t need my backyard ripped up,” Fugard stated.
“However, such is life.”
Fugard says she was involved about her discovery, particularly after studying of the toxicity of the worms, as a result of neighbours and buddies have pets that had been identified to eat bugs. (Jessica Fugard)
From the Invasive Species Centre’s perspective, it is at all times good to report what you see, even when the report finally ends up being inaccurate or frequent.
“We at all times encourage anybody who comes throughout an invasive species to report, and that protocol will depend on the danger evaluation of that species,” stated Emily Posteraro, a program improvement co-ordinator on the centre.
“If it is one thing frequent like garlic mustard, it is good to know the place it’s, but when it is one thing larger on the listing just like the Asian long-horned beetle, we’re on alert.”
Posteraro additionally inspired individuals who see invasive species to ship images and different particulars together with experiences, particularly when probably harmful or damaging species are seen. She added she did not have info pertaining to how critical of a menace hammerhead worms are.
“It by no means hurts to report it,” she stated.
Poisonous, harmful to kids
Université de Montréal entomologist Étienne Normandin stated the worms, which have been reported elsewhere in Ontario and Québec, are a particular concern in his eyes.
They produce tetrodotoxin — the identical toxin produced by pufferfish, that are infamous for killing individuals who eat them if not ready accurately.
“It is a neurotoxin that will get to the mind fairly quick and it may possibly damage you. In fact, the toxin amount could be very small within the hammerhead worm,” Normandin stated.
“However, consider a state of affairs the place you will have a child, for instance, or a child that places soil of their mouth and ingests it. Now, now we have an issue.”
If kids — or animals — with a low sufficient physique weight eat the worms, the hazard is actual, he stated.
There’s additionally an ecological hazard, Normandin stated.
“Hammerhead worms do not have predators, pathogens or parasites. Their inhabitants can develop quick,” he stated, including they usually crop up in new locales due to vegetation and soil being moved from one place to a different.
Hammerhead flatworm sightings have been reported in Gatineau, Montreal, and as far-off as near Trois-Rivières in Quebec, in line with Normandin. (Étienne Normandin/Université de Montréal/The Canadian Press)
Hammerhead worms, as predators, kill native native worms, slugs, leeches and different creatures, and have a unfavorable impact on soil high quality, he stated. The one redeeming issue is that they transfer slowly on their very own, so their impacts are usually localized.
For individuals who might come throughout the worms within the wild, Normandin’s ideas align with Posteraro’s.
“Document, report, report,” he stated, pointing to a web-based platform referred to as iNaturalist.
“It is a well-known platform and scientists use it so much. Recording new observations is essential.”
As of April 16, the web site had verified hammerhead worm sightings in Ontario from Hamilton, Newmarket and Woolwich.
“On high of that, should you discover one, they’ll die fairly quick from salt, or placing them in alcohol or bleach.”
That is recommendation Fugard did not have when she discovered the worm on her property.
“I burnt it. I had my lighter there, so I burnt each ends,” she stated.
Whatever the final result, Fugard stated, she plans to spend a number of evenings within the backyard in search of extra to make sure the state of affairs is handled.
