I went outside just a few moments ago and I saw this worm that I keep seeing around our house. It’s got to be the ugliest damn worm I’ve ever seen.

It’s kind of tough to see in this picture, however, I wanted to show how long the worm was. It was literally about 8 inches long.
I’ve seen them quite a bit on the Big Island. I don’t recall seeing them ever on the mainland.
Here is a close up of the above picture:

I googled “Flat Head Worm” and the first picture that showed up was a picture from a website that used to be on Hunter Bishop’s blogroll, “Hawaiian Highlands” and there at the very bottom of the page was an explanation of what the worm was:
This is a shovel-headed garden worm, Bipalium kewense…

“…Shovel-headed garden worms are carnivorous and eat earthworms, insects, slugs and snails. Strangely they can reproduce two ways: 1) asexually through fission where the tail falls off and grows its own head, or 2) sexually with another shovel-headed worm. An even stranger fact is that these worms eat and poop out the same hole which is located in the mid-section of its underside; according to Tbear that makes them “potty mouths.” Supposedly these flat-head worms are harmless to humans, but they can decimate earthworm populations, and that’s not so good.” HawaiianHighlands
Filed under: Agriculture | Tagged: Agriculture, Strange, Strange/Weird | 40 Comments »