J- 



FOOD OF SLUGS 



CHAP. 



of green food. The capture and eating of insects hj Mollusca 

 seems very remarkable, but this story does not stand alone. 

 Mr. T. Vernon Wollaston once enclosed in a bottle at least three 

 dozen specimens of Coleoptera together with 4 Helix cantiana, 

 5 H. Mspida, and 1 If. virgata, together with an abundant 

 supply of fresh leaves and grass. Aljout a fortnight afterwards, 

 on the bottle being opened, it was found that every single 

 specimen of the Coleoptera had been devoured by the snails.^ 

 Amalia niarginata in captivity has been fed upon the larvae of 

 Euclielia jacohaeae, eating three in two hours.- 



Limax maximus (Fig. 19) has l^een seen frequently to make 

 its way into a dairy and feed on raw Ijeef ^ Individuals kept in 



confinement are guilty of 

 canniljalism. Mr. W. A. 

 Gain kept three specimens 

 in a box together, and found 

 one of them two - thirds 

 eaten, " the tail left clean 

 cut off, reminding one of 

 that portion of a fish on a 

 fishmonger's stall." That 

 starvation did not prompt 

 the crime was proved hj 

 the fact that during the 

 preceding night the slug had been supplied with, and had eaten, 

 a considerable quantity of its favourite food. On two other 

 occasions the same observer found one of his slugs deprived of 

 its slime and a portion of its skin, and in a dying condition.'' 

 An adult L. maximus, kept for thirty-three days in captivity with 

 a young Avion ater, attacked it frequently, denuded it of its slime, 

 and gnawed numerous small pieces of skin off' the body and 

 mantle.^ The present writer has found no better bait for this 

 species on a warm summer night than the bodies of its brethren 

 which were slain on the night preceding ; it will also devour 

 dead Helix aspersa. Mr. Gain considers it a very dainty feeder, 

 preferring fungi to all other foods, and apparently doing no harm 

 in the garden. 



1 Zoologist, iv. p. 1504 ; iii. p. 1038 ; iii. p. 943. 



- H. W. Kew, /. c. " Zoologist, xix. p. 7819. 



■• Naturalist, 1889, p. 55. ^ H. W. Kew, I. c. 



Fig. 19.- 



- Limax maximus L. 

 orifice : x \. 



PO, pulmonary 



