Arion fasciatus
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Arion fasciatus | |
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Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Mollusca |
| Class: | Gastropoda |
| Order: | Stylommatophora |
| Family: | Arionidae |
| Genus: | Arion |
| Species: | A. fasciatus |
| Binomial name | |
| Arion fasciatus | |
| Synonyms | |
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Arion fasciatus, also known by its common name the Orange-banded Arion, is a species of air-breathing, completely shell-less, land slug, a terrestrial pulmonate gastropod mollusk in the family Arionidae, the round-back slugs.[3]
The species was first described by Sven Nilsson in 1823.
Arion fasciatus is originally from Northern Europe, but it has spread to other cool, wet climates, including the British Isles, Canada and the Northern United States. The species was presumably first brought across the Atlantic Ocean during the colonial era. These slugs are generally found in ecotonal habitats.[4]
Description
Arion fasciatus is in many ways similar to most other stylommatophoran slugs. They are hermaphroditic. They have a head, mantle, and foot. There are two sets of retractable tentacles on their heads: the upper pair have light-sensing organs, and the lower two are used to smell. These slugs have a mantle that covers much of the top of the first third of the body, with its pneumostome located on the front right portion of the mantle. On the lower part of the head, the mouth and radula are situated. The orange banded arion has a darkened stripe that extends along the entire body and mantle length on both sides of the body, and is gray, off-white, or tan, with a very light-colored foot.
Arion fasciatus is about six centimeters in length when moving, secreting a clear mucus which is also left behind it and visible as a trail. However, when disturbed, the mucus becomes denser and stickier. A study found that this thicker mucus can prevent predation by Carabid beetles, but that this special mucus becomes exhausted after three minutes of stimulation. It then takes up to a day to get mucus production up to pre-attack levels, leaving the slug susceptible to other predators.[5]
