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Major survey finds worms are rare or absent in 20% of fields in England

fwi.co.uk

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Re: Major survey finds worms are rare or absent in 20% of fields in England

#61

Post by blubbi »

blubbi wrote: post #60
randcraw wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True only if tilling has increased recently. The question is, what has changed since the last time the dead fields had earthworms? That's the cause. Reversing or neutralizing that change is the cure. Let's figure out how to fix this the right way, and now , before the remaining fields die off too.

I don't know the numbers for the UK but here [1] are some numbers for Bavaria with worm counts from a lot of monitoring spots starting in the 80s. (sorry, slides are in German) In the conclusion the author says a connection to the tilling method is likely. (worm numbers in Bavaria actually have increased as more and more farmers have changed away from "full" tilling). [1] https://www.lfu.bayern.de/boden/bodendauerbeo…

Sorry, I should probably add that the worm number also very heavily depends on the kind of ground you have on your fields. In case that is not apparent from the slides ;-)

Re: Major survey finds worms are rare or absent in 20% of fields in England

#62

Post by redtexture »

cpursley wrote: post #54
CalRobert wrote: post #40

I was out digging in my field yesterday (in Ireland, not England) and thought it was interesting that there was a large variance in worm counts. Some areas had massive numbers of worms pushing 20cm, and others had relatively few, smaller ones. The bigger worms were in areas that hadn't been grazed by sheep, but I'm not sure how that relates, if at all (the sheep have been gone for a few years).

Speaking of Ireland, the stereotype is true. The grass really is that green. What is in your soil that causes this? Nitrogen?

It is a well watered island, for one, with climate moderated by the Gulf Stream, even though well north of the US (The Boston USA latitude 42+, Dublin 53+).

Re: Major survey finds worms are rare or absent in 20% of fields in England

#63

Post by mads »

paulddraper wrote: post #55
black-tea wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You drive too far. That's insane.

Time wise though, it might be a faster commute than in Silicon Valley.

Around 1.5 hours today each direction, but I am commuting to a different country and have to cross a bridge.

Back then it was 1 hour or so - maybe a little less if traffic was good.

Re: Major survey finds worms are rare or absent in 20% of fields in England

#64

Post by mads »

zizee wrote: post #51
mads wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also did anyone notice that they don’t clean off insects off their car as often as before? Just 10 years ago, when I used to commute 170km every day in my car, I would have to clean the windshield regularly. I think I cleaned it once the last year and I even travel further today...

Same car? Could improved aerodynamics play a part?

Might be it.. Ford Mondeo back then and an Opel Meriva today.

Re: Major survey finds worms are rare or absent in 20% of fields in England

#65

Post by hinkley »

pilsetnieks wrote: post #19
maxerickson wrote: post #14

In the US, invasive worms are converting forests from fungal decomposition regimes to bacterial decomposition regimes. Not a great development for mushroom foragers. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/invasive-earthwor... Fun stuff.

> Not all foreign earthworms are destructive. Of the 5,000 species around the globe, only about 16 of the European and Asian varieties do the real damage. One of them is the night crawler (Lumbricus terrestris), a popular fish bait that can measure up to 15 to 20 centimeters (six to eight inches). Another is the Alabama jumper (Amynthas agrestis)—also known as the snake worm or crazy worm—an aggressive Asian worm tha…

Red wigglers are also useful for both purposes, and because they don't burrow they have trouble overwintering.

It's not perfect, but they are held to be a lesser of evils.

Re: Major survey finds worms are rare or absent in 20% of fields in England

#66

Post by nikofeyn »

frutiger wrote: post #48
yingw787 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh yeah. Be careful with what you wish for. One day us humans might not be just dominant, we will be alone. And in that sense, I don't want us to prevail against Mother Nature; I just want a healthy balance.

Mother Nature has been around for a very long time. She will not remember us when we are gone.

i hate when this sentiment pops up. it is practically meaningless but can even be even be viewed as harmful. most people don’t care about the environment already, so stating it will live on just silently emboldens people to keep on keeping on. many plants and animals are already dead directly due to human influence and others are to quickly follow.

Re: Major survey finds worms are rare or absent in 20% of fields in England

#67

Post by benj111 »

CalRobert wrote: post #41
ALittleLight wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reminds me of a passage in the book Sapiens, where the author muses that there may have been prehistoric tribes where grandparents told tales of when mammoths were so plentiful hunters would take them every month, and the grandchildren would smile and nod. The grandchildren would in turn grow up and tell their grandchildren that there were once beasts called mammoths, and these grandchildren too would smile and…

The shifting baselines problem comes up a lot; it related to fish catches It's described more here - https://oceana.org/blog/daniel-pauly-and-george-monbiot-conv... and aptly illustrated here - https://oceana.org/sites/default/files/285468/catch_of_the_d... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shifting_baseline

This is interesting, thanks for the links, but.....

It isn't science its basically relying on peoples unreliable memory. Should I believe my uncle Bob, when he tells me he used to catch fish bigger than he was using a homemade hook, and some twine?

So at the moment I'm struggling with what this is. History? Probably. A tool for deciding public policy? Probably not.

I'm not denying the phenomena, just that as it stands theres a severe lack of facts in the linked articles.

Re: Major survey finds worms are rare or absent in 20% of fields in England

#68

Post by nosuchthing »

benj111 wrote: post #67
CalRobert wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The shifting baselines problem comes up a lot; it related to fish catches It's described more here - https://oceana.org/blog/daniel-pauly-and-george-monbiot-conv... and aptly illustrated here - https://oceana.org/sites/default/files/285468/catch_of_the_d... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shifting_baseline

This is interesting, thanks for the links, but..... It isn't science its basically relying on peoples unreliable memory. Should I believe my uncle Bob, when he tells me he used to catch fish bigger than he was using a homemade hook, and some twine? So at the moment I'm struggling with what this is. History? Probably. A tool for deciding public policy? Probably not. I'm not denying the phenomena, just that as it stand…

https://sites.uw.edu/bevanseries/2018/02/28/data-is-in-the-e...

"Dr. McClenachan used photographs taken between 1956 and 1985 to document the loss of the large trophy fish in the Florida Keys, and compared them with photographs that she took in 2007. She found a major shift in species composition across reef communities through time, with larger predatory fish being fished first, followed by a steep decline in the sizes and weights of fish caught more recently. Historically, catches were dominated by large sharks and goliath groupers, but today, the catches are almost exclusively small snappers. Interestingly, Dr. McClenachan found that the cost of fishing trips did not decrease, meaning customers paid approximately the same price for a ~20 kg trophy fish as they do for a ~2 kg trophy fish now, some 50 years later."

Re: Major survey finds worms are rare or absent in 20% of fields in England

#69

Post by benj111 »

nosuchthing wrote: post #68
benj111 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is interesting, thanks for the links, but..... It isn't science its basically relying on peoples unreliable memory. Should I believe my uncle Bob, when he tells me he used to catch fish bigger than he was using a homemade hook, and some twine? So at the moment I'm struggling with what this is. History? Probably. A tool for deciding public policy? Probably not. I'm not denying the phenomena, just that as it stand…

https://sites.uw.edu/bevanseries/2018/02/28/data-is-in-the-e... "Dr. McClenachan used photographs taken between 1956 and 1985 to document the loss of the large trophy fish in the Florida Keys, and compared them with photographs that she took in 2007. She found a major shift in species composition across reef communities through time, with larger predatory fish being fished first, followed by a steep decline in the si…

Thanks. I still have issues though.

We don't know how representative those picture were. The 1950s pictures have survived over a half century, they were taken at a time when photography was harder work than today. I could go fishing, photograph my meagre catch, and put it on instagram for the world to see easily.

Plus these seem to be tourist photos? Maybe its a symptom of (inexperienced) amateurs going to Florida Keys spending big bucks for the experience, whereas in the 50s it was actual fishermen going out to catch big fish, and the very best would take photos of their catch.

Again I'm not denying the phenomenon, just how much we can actually rely on it to tell us something useful. You can't from this array of photos definitively state that populations of x,y and z have dropped i%.

Re: Major survey finds worms are rare or absent in 20% of fields in England

#70

Post by interfixus »

Summer 2017 we were overwhelmed by snails and worm of various species. Summer 2018 was long, hot, and dry. We hardly saw any. But of course they are there. Occasionally, the cats drag in an earthworm. Last winter, mice moved into the house in numbers. We heard them occasionally saw them, cats were constantly on edge, and the mice somehow managed to thrive on catfood. This winter, not a rodent in sight. And this winter so far has been clement. come summer, I expect we'll see snails and worms and mice up to normal - though probably not excessive levels.

Not claiming there are no longer term downward trends. There may well be. I'm not qualified to judge. But often wonder why the huge year-to-year variability of small, fast-breeding species is so rarely touched upon in this kind of article. Small critters can bounce back in force within very short intervals, given anything resembling decent conditions.

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