Snail With Blue Eyestalks by Chipka
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Description
I’d originally planned on continuing with the Fibonacci Sequence, as displayed in previous snail posts, but typing all of those numbers just seemed a bit…daunting. Funny, I can type whole pages of text, but rendering a single line of numbers makes me feel a wee bit hinky. My typing speed slows down immensely. I guess it’s because despite my love of the sciences and the maths, I’m actually not so inclined to do too much with numbers.
At any rate, this is one of the many snails I saw during a particular week in Chicago. If you look carefully, you can see a slug as well—rather blurred in the background as s/he was not within range of my macro lens. There were about 7 or 8 other slugs in the area, all of which moved rather quickly, which is odd, since slugs aren’t known for speed. Ah, but just try capturing one using a macro setting…they’re speedy little critters, racing along at 3 millimeters per second. That’s just enough to blur a macro and give you a blur with eye-stalks.
Unlike the slugs, this snail was in no hurry to get anywhere. At all. In fact, it was quite a shy and skittish thing, prone to withdraw into its shell at the merest hint of a moving shadow. I had to pretend to be a part of the landscape just to get this shot. My knees are still reminding me of that. Patience paid off, however, and after about 20 minutes, the snail peeked out of its shell, looked around, and…well…withdrew again, just after I’d snapped this picture. I suspect it’s a rather tasty species; its behavior indicated that there could have been any number of predators lurking in the shadows. Who knows, maybe the slugs themselves were the predators, since a number of them found it necessary to investigate this particular critter’s shell. (The idea of predatory slugs is rather amusing: they’d be among the slowest predators on the planet.)
I was amazed that there are even snails in this part of Chicago, and so I don’t care how long I had to crouch and remain still to get this one shot. It was worth it, for me at least, especially since I rather like those bluish eyestalks.
There is very minimal postwork on this image. I resized and cropped a bit, and that’s it. The rest is camera settings and a toilet paper core used as a stabilizing device. Funny what you find when you need to improvise!
As always, thank you for viewing and reading and commenting, and I hope you’re all having a fantastic week.
Comments (20)
MrsLubner
I have a plethora of these slime trails! You really have caught interest in this though.
jmb007
bel escargot!!
MrsRatbag
Excellent capture of this timid creature; I guess the slugs are out of focus because they were moving so fast? The cheetahs of the slime world...
Charberry
We have so many snails here. However, your images of these are of a nature art that gets around the garden pest image we have at my house. ;c) Also, I think your snails have more coloring than ours do.
tizjezzme
Neat find and capture!
beachzz
Dang, and I just usually smash the darn things--guess I should at least get a last foto before I do them in. Ghoulish, I suppose, but they eat EVERYTHING!!! Maybe yours are better behaved, they're certainly prettier!!
danapommet
Interesting color in the eyestalks. Sweet textures in the shell and I can see the shinny shell less slug in the background. Dana
helanker
Awesome snail, Chip. It has very beautiful colors. No wonder you couldnt resist and changed your mind :-) I think ill post The Beetles today.
durleybeachbum
I enjoyed your narrative about the capture of this action shot! I have only recently discovered the family of flies that parisitise snails and slugs, what a revelation!
lick.a.witch
Wonderful narrative and amazing image. I am rather partial to these small creatures! I admire their tenacity! ^=^
kgb224
Wonderful capture my friend.
lucindawind
a fabulous capture ... they are quite the little marvel arent they ? !
faroutsider
Gorgeous gastropod! Not a racing snail, then?
flavia49
splendid image!!
sandra46
excellent composition! it almost like a still nature (i don't know why here we call it dead nature).
Sepiasiren
will you just look at that detail--right down to getting a gander at the blue stalks of this creatures eyes--fabulous capture....
auntietk
Huh. Blue eye-stalks ... who knew? You should have been with us this weekend. Some friends invited us up to their campground, and we built the first fire of the year in their 1/2-barrel fire pit. As the fire pit started to heat up, these HUGE slugs started coming out of the bricks. I mean ... they were fat, and about four or five inches long. They'd taken refuge in the cool dark of the brickwork, but when the barrel got too hot ... out they came!
praep
They run and run and run again - very nice shot.
Juliette.Gribnau
wonderful shot.. this is the escargot-snail ( in dutch : wijngaardslak, and when i lituraly translate : vinyard-snail in english)
minos_6
This is a great capture - your patience really paid off! I especially like the earthy colours, and the contrast of the blue eye-stalks! Interesting notion of slugs as the slowest predator - are you sure that's not motion blur in your picture? ......