Last week, when I dug over my small vegetable patch, I failed to see a single earthworm. In previous years, and certainly several years ago, the soil seemed to be full of them. The vegetable patch is used to grow runner beans each year and receives a ready supply of organic material from composted kitchen waste and pigeon litter. No chemicals are used on the soil apart from slug pellets 鈥� containing metaldehyde 鈥� for a few weeks in the spring and I remove them once the bean plants are established. Have the slug pellets killed off the earthworms or are there other forces at work?
Peter Holmes, Helensburgh, Dunbartonshire, UK