- This is the largest terrestrial leach in the Southeast and it's hungry.

It hasn't eaten in more than a week.

What does it eat?

Earthworms.

The leach senses the worm's vibrations and pounces.

It probes the length of the worm looking for an end.

It finds it.

It uses its powerful throat to suck the worm down.

Lady and the Tramp style, the leach won't need to eat for another week.

Okay, yes, that was terrifying.

But let me make the case for the leach here.

This specific species, the haemopis septagon can only be found in like pristine ecosystems, like old growth forests.

So they're an indicator of high environmental quality even though we're not sure exactly what they do in those ecosystems besides eat earthworms.

- A wise tinkerer saves all the pieces.

- That's Alvin Braswell, an emeritus curator at the Museum of Natural Sciences.

He loves these leeches.

- Until we understand all these pieces in our world, it's a little bit dangerous to discard pieces simply because you don't know them or you don't understand them.

- Leeches are kind of like mosquitoes in that we're like, ugh, when we think about them.

But the oldest leach fossils date back 200 million years.

So they've been on this planet longer than we have and more than likely they're doing something very useful in the ecosystem that we just don't understand yet.