Talk:Banana slug

Blatant Plagiarism
Not sure which direct the plagiarism flows, but some of the content matches word-for-word with portions of the banana slug entry on this site:

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.17.243.170 (talk) 23:38, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Regarding the Cleanup Notice
I'm not exactly sure what should be cleaned up. Maybe the article needs to be reorganized? &mdash; Ambush Commander (Talk) 22:09, August 5, 2005 (UTC)

Rethinking
Looking over the article again, I see what you mean. At the time I saw a lot of room for improvement in the writing; I can't dispute its factuality. I'll happily remove the. I still think the syntax and grammar needs some help, but it's certainly not dire. Ringbang 22:15, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

Semantic Mapping
This is an effort to see how we should move parts of this article around. First, we figure out what we have to work with.


 * Leading Paragraph
 * Species — The banana slug is a mollusk of the genus Ariolimax.
 * Size — second-largest species of slug in the world, growing up to 25cm (9.8 inches) long
 * Appearance — Their bodies is usually bright yellow (somewhat resembling a banana); however, the may also be green, brown, or white.
 * Extra blurb about color — Their color changes based on light exposure, food intake, and moisture.
 * Lungs and Location
 * Decomposer/Food preferences + a blurb about how slugs are slow
 * Tentacles
 * Slime
 * Slime as protection from predators
 * Predators of banana slugs
 * Slime as help for transportation, and slime as glue
 * Dormancy during dry periods (slime related)
 * Mating and Reproduction
 * Mascot Blurb

Now... how to reorganize... &mdash; Ambush Commander (Talk) 21:52, August 6, 2005 (UTC)

Reorganization
Maybe something like...

?
 * Intro with taxonomic info
 * Decomposer/Food preferences
 * Physiology
 * Appearance (including color) and Size
 * Lungs and Location
 * Tentacles
 * Slime-related sections (or Slime Talk with your host, Sluggy)
 * Mating and Reproduction (or top-level section?)
 * Mascot Blurb

Ringbang 16:09, 7 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Personally, I think the taxonomic info should stay mostly in the TaxoBox and not really get its own section. &mdash; Ambush Commander (Talk) 22:29, August 16, 2005 (UTC)


 * Ah, I wasn't proposing to add info from the TaxoBox to the prose, just to retain what taxonomic info appears in the prose already. But in that event we're really only talking about citing the genus and the common name of the phylum in the intro paragraph, and looking at the context I only see a need to retain the latter. &mdash; Ringbang 23:55, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

dolichophallus
I got the information on the dolichophallus from the slug article. - Corby 21:21, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Mascot info
User:169.233.29.164 has once again deleted the snippet about the banana slug being the mascot for the University of California, Santa Cruz. I have dropped a note on the IP's talk page. It is somewhat perplexing... I thought it was a quite interesting, albeit a bit eccentric, piece of trivia. &mdash; Ambush Commander (Talk) 21:43, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Size comparisons
"the largest slug is Limax cinereoniger [Ash-grey slug] of Europe, which can reach 30 cm (12 inches) in length" I doubt this is correct as the vast majority of sources place the maximum at 15–20 cm (6–8 in) for this species: 30 cm would be 50–100 % longer and a projected 237.5–700 % heavier. Also, the Great grey slug L. maximus is of similar size, possibly larger. And the Banana slug is apparently bigger than either of the two. --Anshelm &#39;77 21:23, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

. . . . . .???. . . . . ..
"When the slime comes into contact with a moist surface, it produces an anesthetic which causes the membranes to go numb."

The predator's lips for example?

Dolichophallus revisited
Has anyone actually verified the supposed source of the species Ariolimax dolichophallus (Mead, 1943)? Given that the Latin translates to "long penis", I'm rather suspicious of this supposed variant. The only place I've ever seen the phrase used to refer to a banana slug was on a tag for clothing bearing a UC Santa Cruz logo. I suspect that the clothing manufacturer was having a little fun with us. --GentlemanGhost (talk) 00:45, 29 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, I may have discovered my own reference for it, thanks to the archives of the talk page for the UCSC article. However, I still can't help but wonder if this reference's author might have been fooled as well. --GentlemanGhost (talk) 01:03, 29 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Hmmm... I found another reference. Perhaps what I always assumed was a joke actually wasn't after all. Still, it would be nice to see a reference to a peer-reviewed source. "Mead, 1943" doesn't provide much context. --GentlemanGhost (talk) 01:38, 29 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Wow. I finally found the source. I've added a link to this (the original Mead article on JSTOR) within the Wikipedia article. All this time, I thought it was a joke, but this slug really is named for, as Mead puts it, its "most characteristic feature". --GentlemanGhost (talk) 02:17, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Attempting to integrate listings in what was a Trivia section
Here's how it looked just now: "The banana slug is the official mascot of the University of California, Santa Cruz.

In Pulp Fiction, John Travolta's character wore a T Shirt with the UCSC logo of a Banana Slug. This caused sales at the UCSC Bookstore of official UCSC clothing to sky rocket.

It has become a derogatory nickname for the NHL's Buffalo Sabres by fans unhappy with the new Reebok-designed logo.

A banana slug is used in the album cover art on A Perfect Circle's Thirteenth Step.

The Banana Slug String Band (BSSB) has made nature-education songs since the 1970s. See http://www.bananaslugstringband.com.

In a cartoon broadcast on the Cartoon Network called Camp Lazlo, there is an anthropomorphic banana slug that is the scoutmaster assistant." I have tried to integrate two of the listings, if anyone else wants to add in the others, please feel free. Invertzoo (talk) 01:19, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Speed
in the ecology section it mentions that the banaslug is "relativly slow" indicating to me that it is slow for a species of slug, but then goes on to say this is precisly because it's a slug. this wording seems awkward to me, it should either say it is one of the slower creatures in the animal kingdom, or that it is one of the slower kinds of slugs, but it should be clear. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.92.117.233 (talk) 23:01, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Predation habit
Several predators are listed along with the line "they roll the slugs in soil to bind the slime." Which predators roll the slugs? This is behaviour consistent with what I know of raccoons, but seems inappropriate for the snake. Is this behaviour only applying to the salamanders? These sentences need to be clarified a bit. Nutster (talk) 13:42, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

Distinguishing species
The caption to one of the photos says "The placement of the pneumostome on the mantle helps to distinguish the species of Ariolimax", but there's no citation, and I can't find any information on the internet that suggests that that is true.

https://banana-slug.soe.ucsc.edu/lecture_notes:04-23-2010 says, "The only way to distinguish species is by dissection of the genitalia."

Image that came through the Wiki Science Competition
Leaving this image here in case editors of this page find it useful. Uploaded by the photographer for the Wiki Science Competition (it was one of the finalists in its category). &mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 05:53, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Is it still considered a rite of passage to kiss a banana slug?
When I was a kid that was a thing we would do. Pogeons (talk) 00:06, 31 May 2021 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: California Natural History
— Assignment last updated by Calvazark (talk) 05:01, 4 October 2023 (UTC)