That purple stuff they spit at you - is that slag? In other words, besides the damage, does it apply a debuff to your character?
Wouldnât make sense lore wise for it to be slag, but it might still be a debuff
Well maybeâŚ
These things burrow through the ground, right? Slag is a byproduct of eridium processing, and eridium is a mineral on Pandora. So maybe as they chew through veins of eridium, they end up with a belly full of slag?
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It may be different for critters, but:
Dr. Zed : An Eridium shard? Aw, fer â how many times I tell you idiots? You canât get slag powers by swallowinâ this stuff! (âŚ)
Quoted from the âDo No Harmâ mission. But heâs not a real doctorâŚ
Maybe the worms have a different digestive system? Weâve already got fire and acid-spewing skags, and Hyperion havenât even shown up yet⌠Maybe thatâs where they got the idea for slag injection from?
Oh man, I love lore speculation!
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I didnât think about that, i always thought the eridium just kinda poped into existence after you open the vault. It probably is already deep underground and the vault opening just made it move
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Headstone Mine was an eridium mine (spelled âiridiumâ in BL1, as seen in the side quest âSchemin That Sabotageâ) back in the Dahl heyday. Exposure to it (and Vault key fragments) is what mutated some convict-miners into midgets, turned some into psychos, etc. Eridium went crazy and started popping up everywhere in abundance once the Vault was opened.
The crab worms⌠eh I think itâs just purple spit that hurts you. 
âSlagâ wasnât even a twinkle in the writersâ eyes back when BL1 was developed. Itâs fun to speculate on lore though, and retconning certainly is a thing in the Borderlands universe! 
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I thought it kind of âgrewâ.
Which brings up all sorts of interesting theories about Pandora.
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Itâs not a misspelling. Iridium is a real mineral. Itâs a coincidence. Thatâs what I read anyway. 
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