The Unsung Heroes of Rice Farming

These tiny creatures might be the most useful animals on Earth, and you've probably

eaten them before. Because the second they're brought to markets, they're weighed

equally and sealed in individual containers as farmers race to buy millions of them,

since their whole farm depends on it. Because they're taken straight to

flooded rice fields, where thousands are released into the water, starting one of

the smartest farming systems in the world. As while they grow up, they spend each

day eating harmful pests and weeds while digging through the mud to aerate the soil,

giving the rice more oxygen without using any chemicals. But after months of protecting every