Which are the characteristics and organs of the digestive system of earthworms related to the type of diet of these animals?
Earthworms eat decomposing organic material and small organisms ingested together with soil particles. The digestive tubes of earthworms have special structures, such as muscular wall and a gizzard, that triturate the food and scratch it against the ingested soil particles. As annelid digestion is exclusively extracellular earthworms also show in the posterior part of their digestive system structures such as the cecum and the typhlosole that have the function of enhancing the absorption surface of the intestine.