152 KEW: THE FACULTY OF FOOD-FINDING IN GASTROPODS. 
It is interesting to notice, also, that gardeners, who are generally 
much better acquainted with the wonderful food-finding faculty 
possessed by slugs and snails than are most malacologists, regularly 
put down favourite food-substances in order to cause the creatures 
to assemble in given spots so that they may be readily collected and 
destroyed. Cabbage- lettuce- and turnip-leaves, pea-haulm, orange- 
peel, sliced apples, beet-root, potatoes, carrots, turnips, swedes, or 
wurtzels, brewers’ grai ran, bran soaked in greasy pot-liquor, 
stale bread or bran soa akedé in beer, oat- barley- and buckwheat-meal, 
dead slugs, bits of fat meat, milk, strong smelling stale beer, or beer 
mixed with vinegar, beer or porter sweetened with sugar, lard or 
rank butter spread over pieces of board or tile, etc., are among the 
various ‘baits’ recommended by gardeners. Cabbage leaves thus 
used are sometimes warmed and greased,' or, as stated by Loudon, 
they may be rubbed over with the bruised bodies of recently killed 
slugs.* The creatures are found to assemble, often in large numbers, 
round some or all of these substances, so that in the opinion of many 
ardeners or gardening authors the putting down of such baits and the 
collection of the ‘vermin’ therefrom by lantern-light at night-time is 
one of the best ways of keeping the numbers of the animals within 
bounds. In Nicholson’s ‘ Dictionary of Gardening,’ for instance, we 
d the use of baits recommended as one of the most effectual 
remedies which can be directed against the ravages of these pests.” 
distance. The promptitude with which the crushed body of a slug 
is generally found and preyed upon by two or three of its fellows 
has often been remarked upon.* Pea-haulm, as Loudon remarked, 
‘forms a powerful attraction’ ;° and the strong smelling rind of an 
orange, according to another writer, is a great temptation; as many 
as six slugs having been caught on one piece at a time.’ One 
gardener, who used slices of swede turnip as a bait, stated in oe 50 that 
he had thus secured no less than 9,096 slugs and snails, in ten days, 
on about a quarter of an acre of garden ground; the second 
morning’s collection alone yielding 2,056.7 By baiting with cabbage 
1 See for instance Tate's ‘ Land and Freshwater Mollusks,’ 1866, p. 76. 
2 J. C. Loudon, ‘ Suburban Horticulturist,’ 1845, p. 98 
* * Dictionary of Gardening,’ edited by G. Nicholson, A.L.S., iii. (x87), 142. 
+ And see for instance, ‘Garden,’ xxix. (1886), 593. 
* Suburban Horticulturist,’ p. 86 ; and see also, as'to the oe of this bait, J. Wilmot, Trans. 
Hoek Soe., ii. ines 22-43; and R, Gilbert, ‘Garden,’ xvi. (1879 
F. Dobner, ‘Gardeners’ Chronicle,’ and April, 1887 ; ene es — as to the attractive 
eouan of gpa eel, Garden,’ xvii. (1880), 498, and xxiil, (1883), 21 
? T. Colley, ‘ Gardeners’ Chronicle,’ 1850, p. 261. ‘ 
Naturalist, 
