NZ flatworm - wanted dead or alive
A FLATWORM native to New Zealand, Artioposthia triangulata, has shot to notoriety in Ireland and Scotland as the arch enemy of the earthworm. The above caption featured on a recent poster distributed amongst garden societies in Scotland as researchers attempt to map the spread of the murdering import. Thought to have been accidentally imported into Ireland in 1963 in a shipment of potted plants, the flatworm has flourished in the cooler northern climate. Back at home its inability to survive in temperatures above 20°C confines it to forested areas, but in Britain it seems to be adapting to a wide range of habitats and could pose a major threat to horticulture and gardening. One study of a field near Belfast showed a 75% decline in earthworm numbers three years after the flatworm was introduced. Source: New Scientist
Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/FORBI19911101.2.10.4
Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka
Forest and Bird, Volume 22, Issue 4, 1 November 1991, Page 6
Word count
Tapeke kupu
143NZ flatworm - wanted dead or alive Forest and Bird, Volume 22, Issue 4, 1 November 1991, Page 6
Using this item
Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi
For material that is still in copyright, Forest & Bird have made it available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC 4.0). This periodical is not available for commercial use without the consent of Forest & Bird. For advice on reproduction of out-of-copyright material from this magazine please refer to our copyright guide.
Forest & Bird has made best efforts to contact all third-party copyright holders. If you are the rights holder of any material published in Forest & Bird's magazine and would like to discuss this, please contact Forest & Bird at editor@forestandbird.org.nz
Log in