Billions of organisms including earthworms, nematodes, and soil arthropods live beneath agricultural and garden soils. Their welfare and the ecological services they provide deserve attention from welfare advocates.
Soil organism welfare is among the most uncertain and least explored areas of animal welfare. Earthworms show nociceptive responses to injury and have rudimentary nervous systems, but the evidence for conscious pain experience is much weaker than for vertebrates. However, the ecological services that healthy soil organism communities provide — nutrient cycling, soil structure, water infiltration, carbon sequestration — are critical for all life including the farmed and wild animals whose welfare we care about more directly. Practices that improve soil organism health tend to align with those that reduce pesticide harm to other wildlife and improve farming sustainability.