![]() ![]() We’ve been moving worms for centuries, in dirt used for ship ballast, in horticultural plants, in mulch. With the exception of a few native species that live in rotting logs and around wetlands, there are not supposed to be any earthworms east of the Great Plains and north of the Mason-Dixon Line.īut there are, thanks to humans. And worms-with their limited powers of dispersal-weren’t able to recolonize on their own.įor someone like me, who grew up in the Midwest seeing earthworms stranded on the sidewalk after every rain, this was a shocking revelation. Scientists think it killed off the earthworms that may have inhabited the area before the last glaciation. ![]() Its belly rose over what is now Hudson Bay, and its toes dangled down into Iowa and Ohio. Until about 10,000 years ago, a vast ice sheet covered the northern third of the North American continent. But the problem with these worms isn’t their mode of locomotion. ![]() There is something unnerving about their slithering, serpentine style instead of inching along like garden worms, they snap their bodies like angry rattlesnakes. “Holy smokes!” she says, as a dozen worms come squirming out of the soil-their brown, wet skin burning with irritation. Seconds after Dobson empties the contents inside the frame, the soil wriggles to life. It holds a pale yellow slurry of mustard powder and water that’s completely benign-unless you’re a worm. She kicks away the dead oak leaves and tosses a square frame made of PVC pipe onto the damp earth. As I quickly learn, neither trash nor oppressive humidity nor ecological catastrophe can dampen her ample enthusiasm.Īt the bottom of the hill, Dobson veers off the trail and stops in a shady clearing. But Dobson, bounding ahead in khaki hiking pants with her blond ponytail swinging, appears unfazed. Broken glass, food wrappers, and condoms litter the ground. It’s a splotch of unruly forest, surrounded by the clamoring streets and cramped rowhouses of the Bronx. O n a sweltering July day, I follow Annise Dobson down an overgrown path into the heart of Seton Falls Park. ![]()
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