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Showing posts from January, 2009

Bananaslug - really!

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Ariolimax columbianus Jane, our intrepid British Columbia slug hunter searched for the alien Worm Slug (Boettgerilla pallens) without success on Vancouver Island this fall, but she did capture a native Pacific Bananaslug (Ariolimax columbianus) in Vancouver. She made a liason with the Malacologist Robert Forsyth at the Vancouver airport, just as he was about to board a plane to Ottawa to attend COSEWIC (Committee On the Status of Endangered Wildlife In Canada) meetings, and slipped him the container, which he carried onto his flight and passed to me as I met him at the Lord Elgin Hotel. The giant slug (120 mm) was alive and well, though it had thoroughly slimed up the moss and paper towel in its container. The skin of this beast is amazingly slick. Although the body has longitudinal grooves, they are finely incised on a smooth flat surface, nothing like the tubercular ridges of Limax maximus. The colour is like green pea soup, except that the foot fringe pales to yellow toward the