WORMS YOU DON’T WANT
By the time you find your first New Zealand flatworm, it’s too late. Lurking under stones, planks or pots, they keep a low profile, but they are impossible to eradicate and their effect on soil ecology is profound. New Zealand flatworms feed exclusively on earthworms, with such efficiency that populations can be virtually wiped out. This has serious repercussions for soil structure and fertility.
I first encountered flatworms some 15 years ago, in my father’s Shetland garden. Enriched with barrowloads of compost, it should have been teeming with earthworms. By the end of his time there, hardly any earthworms were left. Flatworms – thought to have arrived with topsoil for a local building project – were squashed on sight, but it was a losing battle.
Today, my father gardens in central Scotland, and as we work the soil there, uncovering fat pink earthworms in every spadeful is a delight. This time he is taking no chances: any plants he is given are quarantined and repotted, no soil or compost gets moved in, and the boots I wear there stay there.
The good news is that forewarned, you can keep flatworms out. Most Scottish gardeners know to be vigilant, but gardeners in England tend to
