Is the animal kingdom ruled by tiny worms?

Nematodes are found in every environment on Earth and can survive in some seriously extreme conditions.

They will come back to life after being frozen for 40 thousand years! WHAT THE DUCK?!

There's so much more to these creatures than a chocolate square for an itchy rear end…

Sign up here for the nematode appreciation society.

Featuring:

• Dr Mike Hodda, senior principal research scientist, National Research Collections Australia, CSIRO
• Bethany Perry, PhD student at the ARC Training Centre in Plant Biosecurity, University of Canberra and CSIRO

Production:

• Ann Jones, Presenter / Producer
• Rebecca McLaren, Producer
• Hamish Camilleri, Sound Engineer

This episode of What the Duck?! was recorded and produced on the land of the Ngunnawal, Wadawarrung and Taungurung people.

Find more episodes of the ABC podcast, What the Duck?! with the always curious Dr Ann Jones exploring the mysteries of nature on the ABC Listen app (Australia) or wherever you get your podcasts. You'll learn more about the weird and unusual aspects of our natural world in a quirky, fun way with easy to understand science.