2011 – The Year of My Pet Slug

In 2011 a big, beautiful banana slug took up residence in a pot of ferns on our front porch for 6 months.

My Pet Slug napping in the fern pot. (Right center in pot.) The wood grate is our welcome mat.I have yet to see a banana slug as large as My Pet Slug on slugfari.Hand feeding fresh lettuce to My Pet Slug.My Pet Slug rushing back to the fern pot after a slime about.My Pet Slug with one of its offspring.My Pet Slug often hung out near the base of the fern pot.My Pet Slug giving its offspring a sluggy-back ride.My Pet Slug guarding the house against solicitors. [ Taken with an iPhone before I got an SLR.] Epic slug fight between an invasive tiger slug and My Pet Slug. The tigerslug won. Video of the fight here.The warrior returning to the fern pot after disappearing for a few days following the tiger slug  fight. My Pet Slug’s right vision tentacle was injured, but later repaired itself.Sliming before it disappeared into the dirt on a steaming, hot, dry day.When the temperature rose to over 90 degrees, My Pet Slug disappeared into a hole between the dirt and the foundation of the house next door protected by gobs of its own slime.

Hand-feeding lettuce to a visiting slug in the fern pot.My Pet Slug chased this large banana slug around the porch. Was their encounter territorial or sexual? A few weeks after My Pet Slug disappeared, I saw this slug on the back of the next door neighbor’s house.  Our houses back onto a nature trail, forest and creek. Could it have been My Pet Slug? I’ll never know.  There is more to this story.

My Pet Slug is gone, but I continue to feed lettuce to its babies who haven’t left the pot of ferns.  I hope another banana slug makes our fern pot its spring/summer home in 2012.