Member Article

How slimes have changed

A new species of slug has turned up in a Cardiff garden. The so-called ‘ghost slug’ is from a group more commonly found in Georgia and Turkey, but there are no records of this species.

The slug is white, has no eyes and, unlike British garden slugs, is carnivorous. It eats earthworms at night with its blade-like teeth, sucking them like spaghetti. It lives underground.

Specialists at the National Museum of Wales and Cardiff University were stumped when the creature was sent their way. Ben Rowson, a biologist at the Museum, said: “We had to thumb through lots of old publications in Russian and German to find anything like them - but then discovered they were something entirely new.”

It has been named Selenochlamys ysbrydam, a derivation of the Welsh for ‘ghost’, ysbryd.

Seen one yourself? Let the Museum know.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .