Mini-Chat
Spanish slugs. Pic by Dr Ian Bedford
Donna-Louise Bishop Saturday, September 6, 2014
12:14 PM
A slug expert in Norwich is urging people to stay vigilant against the invasion of the Spanish slug – dubbed the “giant killer slug” – and to help with on-going research.
Known as the arion vulgaris, these types of slugs hit headlines across the country in 2012 after being discovered by scientists in the city and have made a comeback following warnings earlier this year. Ian Bedford, head of entomology at the John Innes Centre, based near the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, first found the slugs here in East Anglia in 2012 and sent them to a colleague in Aberdeen to be identified.
He and others were finding thousands of the species in their gardens, prompting the creation of the website www.slugwatch.co.uk for people to report sightings and get help.
“Feedback from the website has seen that a lot of people are telling us that they have found one or two in their gardens,” Dr Bedford said.
“But what we are looking for now is people letting us know if they are picking up hundreds of Spanish slugs, so that we can make a note of their postcode.”
http://www.eveningnews24.co.uk/news/nor ... _1_3760154
