Contact: Dr. Tim McCay, Colgate University: tmccay@colgate.edu
Initiated: 2013
Project Status: Currently accepting participants
Description
This EREN project is titled “Factors affecting the Distribution of North American Earthworms.”
As you may know, many common earthworms in North America are believed by most scientists to have been introduced to the continent by people, and the dispersal abilities of earthworms are modest in the absence of human help. Although earthworms are frequent guests of our yards and gardens, many remote natural areas have few or no earthworm species – especially in previously glaciated areas. The extent to which different parts of North America are worm-colonized is not well known. The initial phase of the project relates to the relative importance of habitat quality and biogeographic factors in affecting worm presence, abundance, and composition. If habitat quality is predominantly important, that would suggest that the invasion has largely “played out,” and we now find worms in all of the places that suit them. If biogeographic factors (e.g., distance to the nearest road) are important, this would suggest that invasion processes are ongoing. These relationships are likely to vary with glacial history, human land use, and other factors.
Hypotheses/Objectives: We aim to better understand the factors affecting worm distributions using a geographically broad sampling program powered by the EREN network of collaborators.
Summary of Methods: The EREN Worm Project Description includes protocols for the sampling of earthworms and environmental variables potentially important to explaining the presence, abundance, and diversity of worms.
Expanded project info: I invite you to consider participating in the project – in its entirety or in part – in your courses and with your research students. The activities are potentially amenable to lab experiences in courses related to ecology, invasive species, conservation biology, and invertebrate zoology. I also invite participants to think of additional ways of using the data set to look at ecosystem effects of earthworms, earthworm evolution and cryptic species, and other topics.
Curriculum: EREN Earthworm Lab Exercise
Other Project Materials:
- Video: Distributions of North American Earthworms Part 1, Sampling Earthworms
- Video: Distributions of North American Earthworms Part 2, Preservation and Identification of Earthworms
Publications will be linked here when available.