#4628 · 🐌 snails, slugs & other molluscs

Black Slug

🇳🇱 Zwarte wegslak ·Arion ater

LCleast concern 🐌 Snails, slugs & other molluscs 📍 in the Netherlands

10 photos from iNaturalist (Creative Commons) · credits & licences

what is it?

The black slug (also known as black arion , European black slug , or large black slug ) Arion ater L. is a large terrestrial gastropod mollusk in the family Arionidae—the round back slugs. Land slugs lack shells like other terrestrial mollusks (such as snails). Without such shells, slugs produce unappetizing mucus—that may also contain toxins—to deter predators. Terrestrial slugs produce two other forms of mucus that facilitate locomotion and prevent death from drying. Such mollusks are hermaphroditic. Slugs...

base stats

NL sightings 64iNaturalist, research grade
worldwide 52,185iNaturalist observations
threat LCleast concern

Bars compare against all animals on log scales: up to 300,000 Dutch and 600,000 worldwide sightings (the most-seen species), 150 t (blue whale), 30 m and 400 years (Greenland shark).