The Lugworm, a favored bait for sea Angling either from the shore or the boat, I have gathered the following information on this much used worm.
I hope it helps give you a little insight into its habitat and lifestyle, If you like this then maybe I can do more on other bates, just let me know.
Overview
When fully grown, the lugworm of the coasts of
Life in a burrow
A lugworm lives in a U-shaped burrow in sand. The U is made of an L-shaped gallery lined with mucus, from the toe of which a vertical unlined shaft runs up to the surface. This is a head shaft. At the surface the head shaft is marked by a small saucer-shaped depression. The tail shaft, 5-7cm from it, is marked by a highly coiled cast of sand. The lugworm lies in this burrow with its head at the base of the head shaft, swallowing sand from time to time. This makes the column of sand drop slightly, so there is a periodic sinking of the sand in the saucer-shaped depression. When it first digs its burrow the lugworm softens the sand in its head up into the head shaft by pushing its head up into it with a piston action. After that it is kept loose by a current of water driven through the burrow from the hind end, by the waves of contraction passing along its body. It weighs 55-140 grams. Lugworms also have groups of hair on the outside of their bodies that act as external gills. This can rapidly increase its uptake of oxygen.
Burrowing babies
Once it burrows into the sand a lugworm seldom leaves it. It can stay there for weeks on end, sometimes changing its position slightly in the sand. But it may leave the burrow completely and re-enter the sand, making a fresh burrow for breeding but for 2 days in early October there is a genital crisis. This is when all the lugworms liberate their ova and sperms into the water above, and there the ova are fertilized. The ova are enclosed in tongue-shaped masses of jelly about 8 inches long, 7-8 cm wide and 2.5 cm thick. Each mass is anchored at one end. The larvae hatching from the eggs feed on the jelly and eventually break out when they have grown to a dozen segments and are beginning to look like their parents. They burrow into the sand, usually higher up the beach than the adults, and gradually move down the beach as they get older.






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