Smith. — Notes on New Zealand Earth-worms. 189 



Public Scliool, there must Lave been a barrow-load of wrigglers 

 in a heap — a large and excited meeting. Further on, by 

 Latimer Square, there was a more thinly-attended meeting, at 

 which those present seemed to have given it up as a bad job, 

 and decided to take no action." 



At Oamaru, heavy rains fell from 10th August to the 22nd. 

 During the afternoon of the 17th, the rain abated for several 

 hours. Large numbers of weakly and apparently healthy 

 worms were then observed moving in all directions on the 

 surface, while some parts of the fields and public roads were 

 literally strewn with the dead bodies of others ; but all were of 

 the three smaller species which inhabit open lands. The intes- 

 tines of nearly all I examined were quite empty. A few only 

 contained minute quantities of clay, which showed that they 

 had burrowed into the clayey subsoil. At the end of the month 

 many of the lakes and pools formed by the heavy rains had 

 subsided. The bottoms of some were covered thickly with the 

 dead bodies of earth-worms in a putrifying state. The drift 

 weeds clinging to wire fences and gorse hedges through which 

 the floods had passed also contained numbers of dead worms. 

 On the hills and downs where they rose to surface they were 

 instantly swept down the slopes, or scoured out of the earth 

 by the numerous small streams formed by the heavy and in- 

 cessant rains. The weather during the whole period being 

 exceedingly mild, I think their deaths were not in any w^ay 

 accelerated by cold, although vast numbers of both weakly and 

 healthy worms perished by drowning. 



I am not sufficiently versed in the anatomy of earth-worms 

 to discuss the subject fully ; but I think that, were a number of 

 them collected under the circumstances I have described, and 

 forwarded to some specialist to report on them, it would doubt- 

 less settle the question, and explain the cause of their death. 

 Although severe droughts or excessive moisture may generate 

 disease among some species of worms, I am of opinion that 

 more perish from exhaustion during droughts, or from the 

 effects of it, than any other known cause. At Dunedin and 

 other parts of Otago the rainfall for the month of August varied 

 from 1G"12 inches to 19"52 inches, and the destruction of worms 

 during the same period was prodigious. These facts are of great 

 interest in illustrating the effects of extremes in seasons on the 

 actions and mortality of earth-worms. 



