27.000 Teeth!

   I am finally free to hike as I wish other than back too far in the creek.  That is still off limits but only due to the sogginess of the ground. The nightly rains have dumped enough water to fill the creek and let it spill over into the woods.  Not wanting to become mired, I stick to higher ground and nose around in just about any nook and cranny I can find.  This afternoon, I flipped over a rotted log and found...nothing...except a slug.  A lone leopard slug was happily munching on some mold that was growing on dead leaves.  I watched the critter for a while and then lightly replaced the log.  There was no sense in bothering the poor little guy.

  Now for a fun fact!  Slugs very rarely (if ever) bite!  They just sort of slime along when threatened.  That slime is enough to deter most predators so they pretty much live in peace.  But!  Did you know that slugs have teeth?  They do!  In fact, a common slug has about 27,000 teeth!  The teeth are lined up in a fashion that makes them look and act a lot more like a cheese grater than fangs.  To be able to digest the whole assortment (of everything) that it eats, the slug has to have some way of helping it decompose.  Chewing is not a strong point of a slug so it sort of "grates" its food through a series of rows of teeth.  

  Having that many teeth could, indeed, make a slug a ferocious predator.  While there are some that will eat insects, worms and even other slugs, most are content to munch a few leaves, some fungi or your lovely lilies.  We had better be glad that they are just slimy critters that would rather hide than attack.  Just imagine how scary it would be to have car sized slugs with 27,000 teeth!

Slugfest

  It is a regular slugfest out there these days.  The whole thing has gotten where you just can't please anyone and everyone has their own idea just how things should be.  It has gotten to the point that there is just no respect...at all...zilch!  Nah, I am not talking politics here or any other such thing.  I am merely relating the story of another day in cleaning the garden.  With the lack of winter (even though that groundhog vows that we shall have six more weeks of it after our entirety of four cold days), the garden is anxiously awaiting a new batch of seeds.  I am here to please but chores are a necessity to get the place suitable for new plants.

  Yesterday saw me restacking the woodpile and uncovering multiples of critters that had sought refuge between the logs for the supposedly cold weather.  I can deal with critters...except roaches...roaches die.   Or termites...those die, too.  Those are the bane of my existence!  But for the most part, critters are simply snatched up and moved to a more desirable place.  I cannot, however, snatch up a slug without being at least a wee bit squeamish.  Those critters have to be flipped, shoved, wriggled, squiggled or otherwise transferred to a carrier of sorts.  I do move them but not as I would the caterpillars or spiders.  Slugs are just not my thing.

  Being "not my thing" seemed to convince every slug in the state to move to the garden area.  I not only found them in the woodpile but under the garden boxes, in flower pots, on the potting shelf, in the greenhouse, under the bag of potting soil and even on the rake handle. This slugfest has got to stop! I could do the whole salt dissolving thing but that gets a bit disgusting so the slugs are persuaded to take residence elsewhere. Today, alone, probably a good two dozen of the three to four inch long bodies of slime were moved down into the woods.  I figured that they can live in peace there eating all the dead wood and leaves that their hearts' desire and there, they would not be a threat to my tiny seedlings.  Most insects would scurry or fly right back to the garden but I figure a slug might grow weary during the four hundred foot trek.  At least, I hope they grow fatigued and give up on the quest to return.

  The slugs that were carted to the woods were all Spotted Leopard or Great Gray Slugs (one and the same..two names).  These critters can get up to eight inches in length when stretched out as long as they can go.  I am not sure how long these actually were as they were too chilly to do much maneuvering but, in my opinion, they were too long regardless. For now, the slugfest has moved to the wooded area behind the house...or at least until I start finding them again tomorrow as the work continues.