4 ms·
Five years ago my balcony was invaded by fly larvae (maggots i guess) because my flatmate left some raw meat in the trash bin. While trying to contain the invas
by SonicPenguin 9y ago
Five years ago my balcony was invaded by fly larvae (maggots i guess) because my flatmate left some raw meat in the trash bin. While trying to contain the invasion, i put some of them in two or three nested plastic bags, but they ALWAYS found their way through the plastic after some minutes. They were literally making holes in them. I thought this was normal and well-known!
- justinclift 9y agoWell, while might be possible they were properly digesting/biodegrading the plastic involved, it's also possible they were just "chewing holes" in the plastic. eg mechanical action making the plastic smaller, but not changing its chemical structure The caterpillars in the linked article are biodegrading the plastics into non-plastic (fairly quickly). That's the key thing.
- nommm-nommm 9y agoWell if you put me in a plastic bag I would also be able to get out by tearing a hole in the plastic bag. That fact doesn't say anything about my ability to metabolize plastic though. I would never even consider the worms were doing anything else but mechanically chewing the plastic.