In my last post I wrote about a lovely day gardening with my younger daughter, Mrs. Squirrel of Boulder Creek, who is soon to become a mother herself. I promised to tell you more about the fate of a certain blossom, seen below right on the ground, in this photo, as we were leaving for our post-garden-day walk:
Yes, it's the Pacific banana slug (Ariolimax columbianus) , found in damp coastal forests from Alaska to Santa Cruz county, with scattered populations as far south as San Diego county. Here it's doing what it does best - consuming detritus found on the forest floor. You can see it opening its little mouth in this image:
And in the next - you can see its mouth is closed, chomping on the petal. You can also see its breathing hole or pneumostome (on the lower side in the picture), leading to its single lung. (Keep this image of the chomping mouth in mind as you read later in this post...)
Isn't that cool! It had totally eaten the blossom in a few minutes. From Wikipedia:
No, banana slugs are good for the environment. But that's not all. Warning - adult content follows!
Banana slugs are hermaphrodites, and they have penises about as long as their body! You can find this well attested to on various pages such as the following:
Sammy the Slug is also the mascot of U.C. Santa Cruz, where my older daughter attended college.
Originally adopted informally to show the Santa Cruz students' anti-competitive attitude towards college sports, I think spectators now yell "Go Slugs" with the same enthusiasm as any other team followers. I wonder how many of them know about their mascot's hidden assets - I certainly didn't when I began writing this post!
Well, er, Happy Mother's Day!
Yes, it's the Pacific banana slug (Ariolimax columbianus) , found in damp coastal forests from Alaska to Santa Cruz county, with scattered populations as far south as San Diego county. Here it's doing what it does best - consuming detritus found on the forest floor. You can see it opening its little mouth in this image:
And in the next - you can see its mouth is closed, chomping on the petal. You can also see its breathing hole or pneumostome (on the lower side in the picture), leading to its single lung. (Keep this image of the chomping mouth in mind as you read later in this post...)
Isn't that cool! It had totally eaten the blossom in a few minutes. From Wikipedia:Banana slugs are detritivores, or decomposers. They process leaves, animal droppings, and dead plant material, and then recycle them into soil humus. They seem to have a fondness for mushrooms, and they spread seeds and spores when they eat, and excrete a nitrogen rich fertilizer. Thus they are an important aspect of the ecosystem.And by the way, I also read that they do not generally eat your garden plants - leaving that to the non-native European Black Garden slugs.
No, banana slugs are good for the environment. But that's not all. Warning - adult content follows!
Banana slugs are hermaphrodites, and they have penises about as long as their body! You can find this well attested to on various pages such as the following:
Some folks think that there is only one [species], A. columbianus, throughout the range; others claim the presence of a second, A. dolichyphallus. A definitive answer will be a long time coming.The text above is from a 1995 article, Slimes of Passion, published in a Santa Cruz paper - which accounts for the dated "Bobbit" reference! But it is actually a decent article and you can learn more about slug slime and other interesting aspects of the sluggish existence there.
Dolichyphallus translates as "giant penis", and the slugs we know and love definitely live up to it. Banana slug penises have evolved to be almost as long as their bodies. When you consider that the average banana slug is 6 - 8 inches long, this endowment is impressive even by our standards. While having a big member to show off before mating may be a plus when trying to get the attention of that special slimer, there are drawbacks.
Since slugs are hermaphrodites, each partner's wiener must fit into the other's genital opening. This makes choosing a mate of equal size a must. Before actually getting down to it, both partners check out each other's equipment - no slug can ever be accused of rape, because both partners must present their plumbing before anything else happens. If either slug miscalculates, it may get its wanker stuck during actual copulation and be unable to pull out afterward. When this happens, the unstuck partner bites off the stuck one's slughood - scientists call this "apophallation", though "Bobbitization" may have more of a ring in popular circles.
Sammy the Slug is also the mascot of U.C. Santa Cruz, where my older daughter attended college.
Originally adopted informally to show the Santa Cruz students' anti-competitive attitude towards college sports, I think spectators now yell "Go Slugs" with the same enthusiasm as any other team followers. I wonder how many of them know about their mascot's hidden assets - I certainly didn't when I began writing this post!
Well, er, Happy Mother's Day!
Comments
http://curbstonevalley.com/blog/?p=481
I love their camouflage ;)
*cough*
Nice!