One of our readers sent us quite a few pictures of some worm-like creatures that he found on his porch at night. He said it seems like there are hundreds of tiny, blackish worms all over their porch every night.

A frustrated reader wrote to us about the “numerous 1 inch worms” that appear on his porch after it rains. The reader has never experienced the worms-after-rain phenomenon until this year, and he is irritated with the worms’ presence. (Or the presence of whatever creature our reader is finding – they could be slugs, for instance.) He wants to get rid of the worms (or slugs) on his porch, which he regards as nothing but a pest. The worms are brown and, as mentioned, one inch in length. Most notably, the worms are described as having “antennae or eyes” on the front end of their bodies. What are the one-inch, brown worms on the patio after it rains, and how can you get rid of them?

A reader has recently been finding a lot of skinny worms on her patio. Normally they are dead, perhaps because of a lack of moisture (so speculates the reader), and the worms are primarily red, but their underside is beige. (In the pictures the reader sent, the worms look fairly brown too, but they are definitely of a reddish hue.) The reader doesn’t seem to mind their company, but she has a cat that spends a lot of time on the patio, so she wanted to make sure the worm isn’t parasitic. What is the skinny worm on the patio, and is it harmful to our reader’s cat?