{"id":21914,"date":"2022-11-10T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-11-09T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/?post_type=purple_issue&p=21914"},"modified":"2022-11-21T10:23:09","modified_gmt":"2022-11-21T09:23:09","slug":"nick-bakers-hidden-britain-rags-to-riches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/2022\/11\/10\/nick-bakers-hidden-britain-rags-to-riches\/","title":{"rendered":"Nick Baker\u2019s Hidden Britain: Rags to riches"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Nick Baker\u2019s <\/strong>Hidden Britain<\/span><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The popular naturalist, author and TV presenter reveals a secret world of overlooked wildlife<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>\n\n

Rags to riches<\/h2>\n\n
ESTUARY RAGWORMS <\/span><\/strong><\/h5>\n\n

In muddy estuaries live secretive worms with special ways of pulling edible morsels into their lairs <\/p>\n\n

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Despite its soft and lubriciously slimy looks, the ragworm can give a disconcerting nip <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n

HAVE YOU EVER STARED OUT OVER AN estuary in winter? This stark, flat habitat is often heaving with birdlife. What\u2019s the big attraction? What are they probing for? Well, lots of things, but worms are a popular treat and one in particular is worth a closer look: the estuary ragworm (Hediste diversicolor) <\/em>is as beautiful as it is fascinating. <\/p>\n\n

Popped in a tray of sea water, this odd, stringy creature immediately animates and transforms. The greenish sheen of its body gives way to the scarlet of the haemoglobin in its blood vessels, and a fringe of limbs shimmers in a rainbow of reflected colours. Its head, thrashing left and right, sports four black eyes and six furtive, fleshy feelers that suggest the whiskers of a Chinese dragon puppet. A large worm might measure 12cm long and comprise over 200 segments, each with a pair of limbs called parapodia, which sport bristles, or setae. <\/p>\n\n

Ragworms spend their lives in U- or J-shaped burrows in the rich estuarine mud, extracting nutrients from their surroundings in various ways. A pair of hard pincer-like jaws (paragnaths) are used to grab living prey and slice through carrion and plant material. When their burrows are submerged, the worms will reach out for edible morsels, sometimes even leaving their holes completely to hunt for food on the surface of the mud and under rocks. <\/p>\n\n

They set traps too. A net of mucous is cast around the burrow entrance, which traps water rich in plankton and other organic material. The worm undulates its body and fans its parapodia, drawing a current of water down into its lair. It then rolls up this nutritious carpet of mucous and food and swallows the lot. <\/p>\n\n

There is evidence that our humble worm is also a gardener \u2013 of sorts. Juvenile worms create an environment suitable for the growth of bacteria, which they can feast on without compromising their security. Larger worms, meanwhile, have been recorded collecting the inedible seeds of cord grass. They pull them into the mud before letting them germinate into a softer, more appetising meal. Evolved behaviour? Maybe. Or it could be simply a fortunate byproduct of a snatch and grab lifestyle.<\/span><\/p>\n\n

\u201cThe worm undulates its body and fans its parapodia\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n

Over the winter, the worms prepare for the finale of their lives. First, both sexes turn green, but a backdrop of white sperm in the male\u2019s transparent body makes him appear brighter. The pigment is caused by the breakdown of their blood as they divert their energies to producing eggs and sperm. <\/p>\n\n

Then the female signals her readiness to males with a \u2018worm perfume\u2019 wafted from her burrow entrance. The couple don\u2019t meet, he simply releases his sperm outside her front door and she sucks it into her burrow. Spent, he then dies, but she has one last, bizarre, thing left to do. Her body ruptures, releasing thousands of fertilised eggs. Even then, she limps on, undulating her body to oxygenate the burrow until her larvae hatch and she eventually succumbs. <\/p>\n\n

There ends a generation of humble ragworms \u2013 asurprise beneath the mud, quietly going about their business of turning scraps and invisible morsels into a meal for birds, fish and crustaceans. <\/p>\n\n

So next time you find yourself at an estuary, look over the vast slick of smooth sediment before you and spare a thought for what lies beneath. <\/p>\n\n

Ragworms\u2019 scientific name means \u2018unlike in colour\u2019, partly due to the sexual dimorphism in the build up to breeding, but perhaps also because you rarely get two the same <\/p>\n\n

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LOOK CLOSER <\/span><\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Muddy mates <\/span><\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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Lugworms also have parapodia <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The lugworm (Arenicola marina) <\/em>is another common worm of muddy places. Sediment feeders, they process the mud in much the same way as the earthworms in your lawn. Their worm casts are the squiggly extrusions seen at low tide. This marks the exit of their U-shaped burrow, while a nearby pit is the twinned entrance. <\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>\n\n

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ILLUSTRATIONS BY PETER DAVID SCOTT\/THE ART AGENCY <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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