Worms anchored to the skeleton of a young gray whale in a watery canyon off the coast of California are the first known whalebone-eating marine worms. At this all-you-can-eat whalebone buffet, female marine worms never leave once they dig in. Males never visit the buffet — they live inside the females. Bacteria within the females’ roots help the worms eat whalebone fats. A study describing the two new species of worms appears in Friday's issue of the journal Science, published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the nonprofit science society. The worms are the latest discovery in...
