The agronomist warned about the danger of spreading the predatory worm Obama in Russia

Agronomist Andrey Tumanov warned that predatory flatworms Obama nungara found in Austria could reach Russia.

In conversation with aif.ru On Thursday, December 4, the expert said that in modern conditions, new species can appear anywhere, as viruses and pests move quickly around the world, and flatworms are no exception. He stressed that in nature, every predator sooner or later has its own natural enemy, otherwise such species would have taken over the planet long ago.

Tumanov clarified that some pests, getting into unusual conditions, may first die — for example, due to too low temperatures - but later they are able to adapt and return to those regions where they could not survive before.

Now the Obama nungara worm is widespread in France: it eats earthworms, mollusks and insect larvae. At the same time, it has almost no natural enemies in Europe, as birds and hedgehogs avoid it because of chemical protective substances that give it a bitter taste.

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The predatory worm Obama nungara was discovered near Tuln, and scientists at the Vienna Museum of Natural History on December 2 called this discovery an alarming signal. kp.ru . An invasive species can disrupt the ecological balance by destroying important invertebrate species. The worm is native to Argentina, but it spreads easily, including along with ornamental plants.

In November, Alexander Lukashev, director of the Institute of Medical Parasitology at Sechenov University, told how a live worm can get into a person's eye. According to him, infection occurs after a mosquito bite: a thin worm about 10 cm long gets under the skin, which can manifest itself as a slowly moving nodule or heaviness.

In October, scientific observer Nikolai Grinko, in an interview with Moskva 24, said that scientists were able to revive worms that had spent more than 46 thousand years in the permafrost. According to him, nematodes are extremely tenacious organisms found all over the world. Their stability is impressive: for example, after the Columbia shuttle crash in 2003, the nematodes Caenorhabditis elegans, which participated in the orbital experiment, survived at an altitude of 63 km.

Scientists from Russia and Europe have discovered two species of nematodes in the Siberian permafrost: Panagrolaimus, found in a sample about 32,000 years old, and Plectus, which is about 42,000 years old. After the "defrosting", both species came to life, began to feed and reproduce, reports 360.ru .

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