Earthworms
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40 free Earthworms trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Earthworms look simple, but almost everything about them is odd. They have no eyes, no lungs and no bones, yet they sense, breathe and tunnel well enough to have reshaped whole landscapes. Charles Darwin thought them important enough to spend decades watching them, and wrote his final book about what he saw. This quiz covers what a biology class does and then goes further. There are questions on anatomy and what each organ is for, from the mouth to the last segment, along with how earthworms move, feed, mate and repair themselves. Others look at giant species from Australia and the American Northwest, the animals that hunt worms, invasive newcomers, worm charming contests and a few famous worms from games and children's books. It is a good fit for students revising for a dissection lab or an invertebrate unit, teachers who want a ready-made review, and gardeners curious about what is going on beneath the lawn. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so the set works as a study sheet as well as a game.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Charles Darwin's earthworms ignored a bassoon but fled when their pots were set on which instrument?
Piano
A piano sent its vibrations up through the pots, and the worms shot into their burrows the moment a note was struck. Darwin concluded they are deaf to airborne sound but feel tremors in solid objects.
Q 02What wiped out the native earthworms of most northern North American forests thousands of years ago?
Glaciers
Glaciers scraped much of the continent down to bedrock during the last ice age, taking the worms with them. The earthworms in those forests today mostly descend from European and Asian arrivals.
Q 03Which mammal stocks underground larders with earthworms it has left alive but unable to crawl away?
Mole
Mole larders keep earthworms alive but immobilised, so the catch stays fresh. Researchers have found stores holding hundreds of worms.
Q 04When an earthworm is cut in two, which lost part is it most likely to be able to regrow?
Its tail
Its tail is the part an earthworm can most readily replace, while a lost head is hard or impossible to regrow. That is why a worm cut in half very rarely becomes two worms.
Q 05At which ancient English monument did Charles Darwin study how earthworms buried toppled megaliths?
Stonehenge
Stonehenge was worth a special excursion to Darwin, who found some of its outer blocks partly sunk, with the turf sloping up to meet them as worms raised the soil around them.
Q 06Charles Darwin wrote that earthworms did which farm job long before humans invented a tool for it?
Plowing
Plowing was the comparison: Darwin praised the plough as one of humanity's oldest inventions, then noted that worms had been turning the land over long before people existed.
Q 07In the Earthworm Jim video games, what falls from the sky and turns a worm into a superhero?
A robotic suit
A robotic suit lands on Jim and gives him a humanlike body, though outside it he remains a vulnerable worm. He even uses his own body as a whip.
Q 08Which sound gives away Australia's giant Gippsland earthworm as it slides through its wet burrows?
Gurgling
Gurgling carries up through the soil when the metre-long worm moves quickly along its tunnels. The noise is how people detect a species that rarely comes to the surface.
Q 09Lacking lungs and gills, an earthworm takes in oxygen through which part of its body?
Its skin
Its skin does the breathing, but only while it is moist enough for gases to dissolve and pass through. A worm whose body dries out will die.
Q 10Earthworms have no eyes, yet special cells near the front end still let them sense what?
Light
Light registers through photoreceptor cells scattered over the body wall and packed most densely at the front end. A strong beam sends a worm straight back into its burrow.
Q 11Which blood-feeding animals are close relatives of earthworms within the phylum of segmented worms?
Leeches
Leeches belong to the annelid group alongside earthworms, with soft segmented bodies that stretch and contract. Like earthworms, each one carries both male and female organs.
Q 12The old nickname angleworm records the earthworm's long service in which outdoor pastime?
Fishing
Fishing with a hook and line is called angling, after an Old English word for a fish hook, and earthworms have long been threaded on as bait.
Q 13Which name do North Americans give Lumbricus terrestris, the big earthworm sold mostly from Ontario?
Nightcrawler
Nightcrawler fits a worm that comes up after sunset to feed and mate on the surface. It is the example earthworm for millions of biology students, even in places where the species does not occur.
Q 21Annelida, the phylum of earthworms and ragworms, takes its name from a Latin word meaning what?
Little ring
Little ring is the meaning of the Latin anellus, a nod to the bands that mark off each body segment. The phylum holds more than 22,000 species.
Q 22Which tiny bristles on almost every segment let an earthworm grip the soil as it crawls?
Setae
Setae anchor one part of the body while the rest stretches forward. Special ones on the belly even hold two worms together while they mate.
Q 23Which saddle-like band near an adult earthworm's front end shows that it is ready to breed?
Clitellum
Clitellum is the name of the swollen band, which appears only once a worm is sexually mature. It later secretes the sleeve that slides off the body to hold the eggs.
Q 14Which children's author created Lowly Worm, the Busytown earthworm who is Huckle Cat's best friend?
Richard Scarry
Richard Scarry called Lowly his favourite character, and drew him driving a street sweeper and helping in the Busytown hospital. In his earliest cartoon appearances the worm did not speak at all.
Q 15Which oxygen-carrying pigment floats dissolved in an earthworm's blood plasma instead of inside blood cells?
Hemoglobin
Hemoglobin drifts free in an earthworm's plasma instead of being packed into cells as it is in people. It picks up the oxygen that seeps in through the worm's moist body wall.
Q 16Which word, better known from the insect world, names the capsule where earthworm eggs develop?
Cocoon
Cocoon is the term for the sealed, onion-shaped capsule that slips off the worm's body and is left in the soil. The young emerge as tiny worms, with no larval stage.
Q 17What are the small coiled heaps of digested soil that earthworms leave on a lawn called?
Casts
Casts hold more plant-ready nutrients than the soil around them. A lawn dotted with the heaps is a sign of healthy, biologically active soil.
Q 18Which small earthworm, also called the tiger worm or brandling, is the usual choice for worm bins?
Red wiggler
Red wiggler worms thrive in rotting vegetation and manure, not ordinary soil, so a box of kitchen scraps is ideal for them. Handled roughly, they give off a pungent liquid, hence the species name fetida.
Q 19What name is given to the fertilizer made when earthworms break down food and garden waste?
Vermicompost
Vermicompost holds its nutrients in a water-soluble form that plants take up easily. The worms most used to make it thrive in shallow bins, feeding on decomposing plant matter.
Q 20Which muscular organ grinds an earthworm's food, using swallowed grit in place of teeth?
Gizzard
Gizzard walls squeeze hard, crushing each mouthful against mineral grains the worm has swallowed. The resulting fine paste moves on to the intestine to be digested.
Q 24When two earthworms pair up on the surface to mate, what does each one pass to the other?
Sperm
Sperm travels in both directions because every earthworm is a hermaphrodite, carrying male and female organs at once. Each partner stores what it receives and later uses it to fertilise its own eggs.
Q 25What fills the body cavity of a boneless earthworm, acting as the skeleton its muscles push against?
Fluid
Fluid held under pressure in a chamber called the coelom gives the worm its firmness, an arrangement known as a hydrostatic skeleton. Squeezing it is how the animal alters its shape.
Q 26Which five paired structures near an earthworm's front end pump blood and are often called hearts?
Aortic arches
Aortic arches loop around the gut in segments seven to eleven, squeezing blood down to the vessel that runs along the belly. Blood returns forward through a vessel along the back.
Q 27Unlike a human spinal cord, an earthworm's main nerve cord runs along which part of its body?
The underside
The underside carries the nerve cord, which swells into a small knot of nerve cells in almost every segment. A two-lobed brain sits above the gut near the front.
Q 28An earthworm stretches longer and thinner when which set of muscles in its body wall contracts?
Circular
Circular muscles squeeze a segment the way a hand squeezes a tube of toothpaste, forcing it to lengthen. The longitudinal set then shortens and fattens the segment, pulling the rest of the body along.
Q 29Which muscular part of an earthworm's gut works as a suction pump to draw food into the mouth?
Pharynx
Pharynx walls are thick with muscle that draws food in, while glands there coat each mouthful in mucus. The food then moves on down the gut to be crushed and digested.
Q 30Which fleshy lobe overhangs an earthworm's mouth and helps it feel and taste its surroundings?
Prostomium
Prostomium means before the mouth in Greek, and the lobe seals the opening when the worm rests. Some species use it like a finger to grab leaves and drag them into the burrow.