In article , Janet Baraclough.
.. writes
The message
from Jane Ransom contains these words:

In article 1gbflld.1ppi3zj1bbug8uN%hughchal_nospamthanks@eir com.net,
Hugh Chaloner writes
Hi,

I seem to have an almost total lack of worms in my garden - I've been
digging down to about 15 inches and haven't seen a single worm. Any
ideas why this might be? I'm new to this garden and the soil looks
fairly dusty and poor. Would I be rewarded by introducing some worms
from my sister's wormery - she has loads. Would adding some bulky
organic matter help?

Just check you don't have any New Zealand flatworm first, or any worms
you introduce will be consumed by them anyway

Fortunately the threat to UK native worms from NZF has turned out to
be far less than anticipated. The NZF's are very slow, don't burrow, and
only live above the soil surface, so they are far more vulnerable to
predators and temperature, and don't intrude down into the soil where
earthworms mostly live, feed and breed.

That explains why they coexist with earthworms in New Zealand (which
IIRC has a lot of introduced european species as well as the native NZ
worms)
--
Kay Easton

Edward's earthworm page:
http://www.scarboro.demon.co.uk/edward/index.htm