Earthworm excreta attract soil springtails: laboratory experiments on Heteromurus Nitidus (Collembola: Entomobryidae)

Microarthropods are often found more abundantly in soils with earthworms than in soils without. Earthworms probably create a favourable environment for microarthropods but few studies have aimed to explain this earthworm effect. The soil collembolan (Hexapoda) Heteromurus nitidus, living in soils at pH>5 only and thus rich in earthworms, is particularly attracted by earthworms in humus cores. The effect of earthworms on the distribution of H. nitidus can be mediated either by direct contact or by odour perception. Two experimental designs were used to determine the pathway of attraction. The first set of experiments studied the effect of direct contact with earthworm excreta on the distribution of H. nitidus. The mixture of urine and mucus of the lumbricid earthworms Aporrectodea giardi and Alollobophora chlorotica significantly attracted H. nitidus as compared to deionized water while fresh earthworm casts were not preferred to calcic mull made of older casts. The same experiment involving direct contact with mucus and methyl blue showed that Collembola sucked on mucus/urine, indicating that the interaction of Collembola and earthworms was at least partly trophic. The second experiment demonstrated that H. nitidus was attracted by the odour of Aporrectodea giardi at short distance. The odour of excreta (mucus, urine and casts) of Aporrectodea giardi also attracted H. nitidus but this attraction was weaker and did not occur constantly, possibly due to interactions with light and aggregation pheromones. We conclude that the prominent pathway by which earthworms could attract H. nitidus in the field is through direct contact with earthworm mucus and urine. The acid-intolerant distribution of this species in the field could be partly explained by a trophic interaction with some earthworm species.