Banana Slug, Washington USA [OC]
2mon 17d ago by discuss.tchncs.de/u/CopeCola in photography from discuss.tchncs.de
Took this one near a waterfall off a service road at the base of Mt. Rainier.
Bonus Shots:
One thing to love about banana slugs: the name is a perfect description of the color (sometimes) and size. The picture doesn't really put it completely into context, but these mofos are huge! They can grow up to 26 cm/10 inches long!
Also some of them have dark spots, just like an overripe banana!
(Not my photo sadly, as I've never seen a spotted one in the wild, but they're out there!)
Very cool! Now I want to go back and see if I can find some variants!
I just read today they're the second largest slug!
The largest is the Leopard slug, yeah? I saw one of them in Ireland a few years back and it had some really neat looking patterns.
Unfortunately you don't have to go that far to find them; leopard slugs are among the invasive slugs taking over the PNW (I find them in my garden constantly). I will admit, though, that they are super cool, especially when they're full grown. Watching them hunt is a hoot, like a slow-mo kaiju.
I wish I had put something down for scale! Cool to know they can get even bigger than this one (approx 15-17cm).
Banana slugs are so cool! Unfortunately they're being displaced by invasive European slugs. I hardly ever see bananas anymore...
This is the first one I've seen in the wild, and they are fascinating to watch! I probably spent an hour just following it around while it slimed along every surface in its path.
I didn't realize they were being displaced..
I definitely saw a lot more of them when I was younger
Ring ring ring ring ring ring ring,
Banana slug...
That first picture makes it look enormous. We need a banana for scale. Very cool find BTW.
Kiss it for the street cred
Darn things ate my apples last year while they were still buds
woah, did you have a bunch of them swarming your trees?
Not swarming necessarily. Living in the forest so they're just everywhere
Makes sense, these guys can really cover ground quicker than I would have guessed by looking at them. It would be interesting to set up a time laps to catch them hunting your apples.
Lovely waterfall environment.
By Jesus-Thor how big is that thing
Between 3 inches and 3 feet, but never more than 7 feet.
I'd guess it was 15-17cm/ 6-7 in. Absolute unit of a molluscs!