This article is about animals known as worms. There is also an article about computer worms.
A
worm is any of numerous relatively small elongated soft-bodied
invertebrate animals. The most famous is the
earthworm, a member of
phylum Annelida, but there are hundreds of thousands of different
species that live in a wide variety of habitats other than
soil.
Originally, the word referred to any creeping or a crawling animal of any kind or size, such as a serpent, caterpillar, snail, or the like. Later this definition was narrowed to the modern definition which still includes several different animal groups. Some of these are from the phyla: Annelida, Chaetognatha, Nematoda ("roundworms"), Nemertea and Platyhelminthes ("flatworms"). Many insect larvae are also called "worms".
The night crawler[?] (Latin name Lumbricus terrestris) is very similar to the common garden worm[?].
"Worm" phyla include:
- Acanthocephala - Spiny headed (Thorny headed) worms
- Aeschelminthes - "round worms" (includes the phyla Nematoda, Rotifera, Gastrotricha, Kinorhyncha, Nematomorpha, and Priapulida
- Annelida - Segmented worms without setae -- including earthworms
- Chaetognatha -- Arrow Worms
- Echiura -- Spoon Worms
- Gastrotricha --
- Gnathostomulida -- Jaw worms
- Hemichordata -- Acorn worms (chordates)
- Kinorhyncha
- Nematoda -- Ribbon worms
- Onychophora -- "Velvet worms" (Arthropods or close relatives thereof)
- Platyhelmintha -- flatworms
- Pogonophora -- Beard Worms.
- Polychaeta -- segmented worms with setae
- Priapulida
- Sipuncula -- "Peanut Worms"
- Rotifera
- Urochordata - Tunicate worms (possibly chordates)
- Vestimentifera
Worm is also a Nordic word for a dragon (also spelled "Wyrm").