Camera Critters Snails and Slugs

 
 

I always have a lot of snails and slugs in my garden, which I really hate for many plants are destroyed during the night. Snails are especially active in rainy weather and at night. Every year they eat my hostas, but this year I put slug-pellets around the plants and I managed to save them.


Common snails have pale grey moist skin. At the front end are four tentacles, the shorter two are for feeling and the longer pair are eye stalks. The shell of these snails is light brown with darker brown bands following the spiral of the shell. The shell colouration varies in its intensity from pale yellow to almost black.


Reproduction
Common snails, like all land snails, are hermaphrodites. This means that they possess both male and female reproductive organs. Despite this they still need to find another snail to mate with. When two snails meet during the breeding season (late spring or early summer), mating is initiated by one snail piercing the skin of the other snail with a calcified 'love dart'. The exact purpose of the 'love dart' is not fully understood but it seems to stimulate the other snail into exchanging small packets of sperm. After mating is complete the snails will produce eggs internally, which are fertilised by the sperm that has been exchanged.

Up to about a month after mating the snail lays about a hundred small white eggs in a nest underground in damp soil. If the conditions remain suitable for the eggs, snails will begin to hatch after about 14 days. Newly hatched snails have a small fragile shell and it takes two years for them to reach maturity. More facts are to be found Here




Jedediah drew my attention to this video by David Attenborough. It's about the mating of slugs. Thank you so much, Jedediah!

Camera Critters is hosted by Misty Dawn. Thank you so much Misty Dawn.We all enjoy seeing and talking about animals. All creatures great and small give us much pleasure.If you want to see more Camera Critters click on the logo in the side bar.

CC Termites

Another kind of critters in Australia, where I stayed for six weeks to see my daughter. The first time I came to Australia, now more than twelve years ago, I asked about the brown, grey or white mounds among the trees, and it was then that I learned they were termite mounds.

Termites may be considered a pest from a human point of view, but their behaviour and biology is among the most sophisticated and fascinating in the insect world. Like ants, bees and wasps, they are 'social' insects, living in colonies with thousands of individuals of various 'castes' each with a specific function. Most termites are blind and prefer to live in the dark.

Queen King
The Queen termite is the only individual able to lay eggs - her sole function. She is capable of nothing else since her huge abdomen, bloated with eggs, prevents her from moving. She may produce 2000 eggs or more per day. Living in a chamber deep inside the nest, she is fed and groomed by worker termites who also take care of her eggs, carrying them away for hatching. The Queen may live up to 30 years. Tiny creatures in relation to the Queen, King termites live only to mate with her, and while he is quite long-lived when compared to 'ordinary' members of the colony, their lifespan is usually much shorter than that of the queen. They also assist in grooming and feeding her, and will continue to mate throughout their life, ensuring that a steady supply of new colony members is maintained.


Worker Soldier
The Worker termites comprise the majority of the population of a nest, and are the ones who do the colony's 'dirty work', building and repairing the nest, grooming other termites and foraging for food. They are the ones responisble for structural damage to timber. Once a worker has eaten its fill of wood, special bacteria within its gut help it break down the normally indigestible material into a 'soup' which it takes to the nest and shares with others. The fearsome Soldier termites guard the nest from predators. They are usually distinguished by their hugely enlarged heads accommodating massive jaws, their main weapon. Some termite species have also evolved formidable chemical weapons. Nasute (latin for 'nosey') soldier termites repel their enemies by squirting then with a poisonous or sticky substances through a prominent nozzle-like protrusion in their heads.


Nymph Alates
When termite eggs hatch, the young insects or Nymphs are capable of developing into whatever caste is most urgently required by the colony - normally workers or soldiers, or even additional Queen or King termites if more eggs are needed. When conditions are suitable, however, they may develop into a specialised winged caste known as Alates in preparation for establishing a new colony. Alates are the future Kings and Queens of a termite colony. When seasonal, food and weather conditions are just right, winged Alates will swarm from the nest in search of new territory. They are rather poor flyers and depend largely on the wind to carry them along. When a likely nesting location is found, they soon drop their wings, mate and breed new generations of workers and soldiers, starting the cycle again
You can see here more termite mounds


Camera Critters is hosted by Misty Dawn. Thank you so much Misty Dawn.We all enjoy seeing and talking about animals. All creatures great and small give us much pleasure.If you want to see more Camera Critters click on the logo in the side bar

 
 
 




Termite society

Termites may be considered a pest from a human point of view, but their behaviour and biology is among the most sophisticated and fascinating in the insect world. Like ants, bees and wasps, they are 'social' insects, living in colonies with thousands of individuals of various 'castes' each with a specific function. Most termites are blind and prefer to live in the dark.

Queen King
The Queen termite is the only individual able to lay eggs - her sole function. She is capable of nothing else since her huge abdomen, bloated with eggs, prevents her from moving. She may produce 2000 eggs or more per day. Living in a chamber deep inside the nest, she is fed and groomed by worker termites who also take care of her eggs, carrying them away for hatching. The Queen may live up to 30 years. Tiny creatures in relation to the Queen, King termites live only to mate with her, and while he is quite long-lived when compared to 'ordinary' members of the colony, their lifespan is usually much shorter than that of the queen. They also assist in grooming and feeding her, and will continue to mate throughout their life, ensuring that a steady supply of new colony members is maintained.


Worker Soldier
The Worker termites comprise the majority of the population of a nest, and are the ones who do the colony's 'dirty work', building and repairing the nest, grooming other termites and foraging for food. They are the ones responisble for structural damage to timber. Once a worker has eaten its fill of wood, special bacteria within its gut help it break down the normally indigestible material into a 'soup' which it takes to the nest and shares with others. The fearsome Soldier termites guard the nest from predators. They are usually distinguished by their hugely enlarged heads accommodating massive jaws, their main weapon. Some termite species have also evolved formidable chemical weapons. Nasute (latin for 'nosey') soldier termites repel their enemies by squirting then with a poisonous or sticky substances through a prominent nozzle-like protrusion in their heads.


Nymph Alates
When termite eggs hatch, the young insects or Nymphs are capable of developing into whatever caste is most urgently required by the colony - normally workers or soldiers, or even additional Queen or King termites if more eggs are needed. When conditions are suitable, however, they may develop into a specialised winged caste known as Alates in preparation for establishing a new colony. Alates are the future Kings and Queens of a termite colony. When seasonal, food and weather conditions are just right, winged Alates will swarm from the nest in search of new territory. They are rather poor flyers and depend largely on the wind to carry them along. When a likely nesting location is found, they soon drop their wings, mate and breed new generations of workers and soldiers, starting the cycle again.