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I want to know. Why did God create slugs? And if God didn't do it, what possible useful purpose could slugs have in the natural order of things? Snails are at least pretty, but there is nothing lovely about a slug. And definitely nothing lovely about what they do to my garden!!
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I think they're pretty neat. And they can't hide like snails. What do they do to gardens?
I think I'm just so fond of the Aplysia species that live in the ocean that I like them all. They are so pretty when they swim, but I haven't found a good picture yet. And they are very important in many areas of research. Maybe that is why slugs exist. http://www.brembs.net/learning/aplysia/aplysia.htmlPosts: 1014 | Registered: Jul 2005
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Slugs are much lovelier and more purposeful than mosquitoes. I still want to ask God why He created mosquitoes... Posts: 9538 | Registered: Aug 2003
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Slugs have their place in the ecosystems they're a part of. They're high in protein, and provide meals for lizards, turtles, toads, frogs, some snakes, a number of birds, and lightning bug larvae.
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Mosquitos, in egg, larvae, and adult form, are also an important food source for all sorts of creatures.
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Theca, they destroy gardens and leave slime trails all over everything. Last year they ate more of my strawberries than I did. They're just starting to come out of hibernation now. In the face of today's absolutely beautiful weather, I can look forward to a full summer of slugs everywhere. They particularly seem to like my front porch, where they have been known to crawl up the door leaving slime as a nice parting gift for me to enjoy scrubbing off. My door can't possibly taste good. They like the garage door too, which is just weird. Slimey trails of sluggy visitation make a strange maze on our garage door by the end of the summer.
The worst thing is, they don't do much of anything to blackberry bushes, which I could use some help in cutting back. If they're going to destroy my plants, couldn't they do the weeds first?
Every summer as they devestate my perennials I have wondered over and over, why do slugs exist?
Perhaps it's for the beauty of watching them swim. I love to watch jellyfish swim.
Posts: 5948 | Registered: Jun 2001
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Other insects and larvae can provide food sources for other creatures. The only thing mosquitoes and fleas do that other insects don't is to spread diseases. (and thus keep me employed, but I'd still rather live in a world without either.)
Posts: 2069 | Registered: May 2001
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What is the purpose of rhinoviruses? I mean, all they do is give us colds. How useful is that?
And scabies? What are they good for? An instrument of evil, I tell you!
And what is the purpose of the guy at the cinema who tears your ticket in half? Why can't they sell them already torn in half?
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They also make for great movie scenes like the one in Stand by Me. Yes, those were real slugs on Will Wheaton!
Posts: 2445 | Registered: Oct 2004
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jeniwren, it does suck when animals take more than their fair share, doesn't it? Last year racoons made off with every ear of my parents' half acre or so of corn. Every ear! And turtles will gorge themselves on strawberries if given half a chance. In my experience they rarely eat the whole thing--they'll just take a bite and then move on to the next berry.
Have you looked into ways of controlling your slugs? Maybe buying lightening bug larvae? That way you'd not only get to eat more of your produce, but would be able to enjoy that many more lightning bugs as well.
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sL, how do you get the slime off your hands to pop the top off your free soda? Blech...
Noemon, we do several things, but mainly, we cut the ones we find in half and throw them into the grass to decompose. I've tried chemical warfare but really don't like that method as most effective slug bait is harmful to animals and small children. As I have both, and we've acquired several wild cats around our property, I don't want to do that this summer. I've heard that dishes of beer work really well as a slug trap, but haven't tried it yet. I don't know if lightning bugs can survive here...I've never seen them anyway....
That's very rude of the turtles, btw. Slugs do the same thing, while also leaving slime all over the partially eaten strawberry. So you can't even cut out the yucky parts and eat the rest. And the racoons...that's terrible. Every ear?
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The dishes of beer work, but they are sooooo disgusting to dispose of, and as with any bait, I'm always wondering if they are calling slugs from other locales that wouldn't normally be in my garden.
Posts: 3149 | Registered: Jul 2005
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Yep, every ear. My parents would look at them, determine which ones were going to be ripe the next day, and then find them stolen the next morning.
We were never really bothered with slugs when I was still living with them, but that may be related to the incredible profusion of lightning bugs we enjoyed. As a result, I was never really put off by them, and have always found their trails pretty. I like the way they glint in the sun.
I've heard that the beer thing works really well, but I've never had the heart to try it.
You can't eat the turtles' leftovers either--they are carriers of salmonella, so eating after them is a fairly bad idea.
If lightning bugs aren't native to your area I'd be careful about introducing them. Might not be a bad idea to look into other insects whose larval forms eat slugs though--I know that others exist. If some of them are native to your region you can seed your land with them without worrying too much about starting something nasty.
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In reading more about lightning bug larvae, it would seem that they are capable of tracking slugs down by following their slime trails, and that they have been observed hunting (relatively) large prey cooperatively.
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Jeni- beer traps work, and so do compost traps. (Put a few inches of water in the bottom of the plastic container you store kitchen waste in- you know it needs cleaning anyway- and the rotting food will attract the slugs, and they drown. Then they get to serve a purpose in my compost bin) They also will not cross copper- they sell copper strips at Loews.
Posts: 2711 | Registered: Mar 2004
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Gotta agree on the beer thing. I put little dishes of beer out one summer and caught dozens of slugs over a few weeks. I caught fewer the next year, and eventually stopped in that garden because the slugs were no longer a problem.
Posts: 6394 | Registered: Dec 1999
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Romany, that's fascinating about their aversion to copper. That's actually very helpful in terms of a story idea I've been kicking around for the past little while.
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The best (and only) redeeming quality in slugs is that they make a popping sound when you step on them Posts: 862 | Registered: Oct 2003
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The purpose of slugs is, obviously, so that they can put the bad guys in jail on Law and Order and CSI.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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What bothers me about slugs is that they don't eat all the dandelion leaves or even the leaves of plants that have already bloomed, they go straight for things like my poor irises and lilies and eat them to the ground, while dandelions flourish. I used to use a pet safe slug bait, but my dad gave me a bag of industrial stuff that he advised me not to handle with bare hands. I unabashedly use whatever means necessary to kill them (and the snails). I've never heard of using lightening bugs before though, I'll have to look into it. Lightening bugs aren't indigenous to the pacific northwest, though, so perhaps it wouldn't be right to import them.
Posts: 349 | Registered: May 2003
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Copper is not the only thing that repels slugs. They can't withstand salting. If you salt a slug, it dies in a Wicked Witch of the West kind of way -- I'm melting! Melting!
This is why, if you are at a garden party, you should never drink beer. Your glass will attract all the garden slugs. Instead, ask for a Margarita. The salt around the rim will keep the slugs out of your drink.
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Slugs are good for entertaining young children. Give a kid a salt shaker and a garden full of slugs and he's entertained for hours.
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CT, you are truly a woman of exceptional empathy, if you find yourself caring about the pleasure of slugs.
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Actually, I've tried the salt thing and really felt very bad afterward for doing so. Chopping them in half is gruesome but quick. The salt really seems to hurt them as they writhe about.
I don't like slugs, but I don't wish them any ill will except in defense of house and garden. I wish I could convince them to eat the blackberry briars.
Thanks for the info, romany. Is that what you do?
Posts: 5948 | Registered: Jun 2001
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There is a slug festival I've been to when I was little, where people brought slugs and raced them. It was a little fun, except for the fact that the slugs were slow and the people had to get their hands slimy.
Another purpose of slugs was for my brothers, when they were children, to urinate on them. Posts: 1417 | Registered: Aug 1999
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quote:Originally posted by jeniwren: Actually, I've tried the salt thing and really felt very bad afterward for doing so. Chopping them in half is gruesome but quick. The salt really seems to hurt them as they writhe about.
You know, they really can't feel much in the way of pain -- simply don't have the nervous system for it.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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You know, I've heard that about a variety of animals, from worms to fish to frogs, and I've always been a bit skeptical of the claim. Wouldn't the ability to feel pain be a pretty important thing for any motile creature to have? If they are incapable of feeling pain, how do they avoid things that would cause damage to their bodies? When you do things to them that would cause them pain, they certainly react to them, and will generally try to get away from the thing that's causing them damage. If they can't sense pain how do they know to do that?
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I don't know if they can't sense pain, as much as they don't have any conception of suffering. It's a simple avoidance response system. Slugs don't have anything that you could really call a brain, a nerve bundle, but nothing that thinks.
Wow, I just wasted way too much brain power talking about slugs' feelings. I'm gonna go salt a couple to get my money's worth.
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quote:Instinctive reactions do not require pain stimuli.
I know, I've heard this from biology teachers before. It's just never completely made sense to me. You aren't arguing that they don't possess a sense of touch, right? Just that they don't feel pain?
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I'm not convinced simple organisms like slugs have ANY kind of conscious awareness. They're more like little computer programs -- Light? Move toward. Touch? Move away.
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I thought it was funny the way they talked about it. And the line at the end about motivation vs. hard-wiring seems to fit. Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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