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Photo Credit: Xavier Brooks
Shaena Jakob's Midnight Slug Collection
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Today Leo left for Lethbridge with his precious cargo of teens: Xavier, Naomi, Shaena Jakob, Mikaela and Cyra.
I love to hear what kids have enjoyed most as they leave the property.
Naomi said that laying in one of the floating tube on the water was pretty high on her list, as were the hammocks, though not the three-sided hammock.
She finds the regular hammocks easier to hang out in and easier to slip out of.
Shaena Jakob is Xavier’s friend who flew to Lethbridge from Ottawa this summer. She is the woman who collected slugs one midnight, slug by slug. First one, then another. Soon she had 17 in her hand, charmed that they would take to her, as she did to them.
“Wasn’t it hard getting all of the slug slime off?” That is the question most of midnight-travelling friends asked as well.
I was more interested in why she collected them. She said slugs are just so interesting. I thought to myself, while in the past, others may have collected slugs to pour salt on them (a past practise I remember of others, not me), she carefully studied them, and then let them go.
“How long did it take for them to leave?” I asked.
“About an hour, maybe 45 minutes. Forty-five minutes for the fast ones. I just said, ‘Ya! You go. And then I watched them travel away,” she said.
The above experience was report to me by Shaena, not experienced by me.
Arta
I never had a fondest for touching slugs, but as I child I did do some thinking about these creatures.
ReplyDeleteWhile others dreamed of animals they could hold, pet, snuggle, or play with, I began to envision a slug friendly farm.
As my dream developed my plan materialized in the form of a circle of large rocks, two rocks high, and large enough that an eight year old girl could lay down inside.
The collection of the creatures required large leaves and great patience, as one by one I gathered enough that their number matched my vision of a large extended family.
Imagine my disappointment when the next day I woke to discover the only trace of my efforts was in multiple trails of slime lead off to moisture pastures.
Would you have built this on the roadside of Panabode I, or down at the forest. A lot of work for a little girl, rocks two rocks high and then the stability of having them stay there. Thanks for the story from the past. Now at least four decades ago.
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