seasonal snails
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Fred Schueler
Nov 1, 2024, 10:53:15 AMNov 1
to Eastern Ontario Natural History listserve, Robert Forsyth, Marla L. Coppolino, Kara Layton, Kevin Willey
Everyone,
Over the past three years, Kevin Willey & we have been hacking down
invasive Cathartic Buckthorn on his land E of St Lawrence Street in
Bishops Mills, and we found that the resulting piles of twigs and
foliage were swarmed by the introduced Cepaea nemoralis snails at a
density that we compared to "the Christmas tree of a household that's
inherited ornaments from four grandparental households," and the
Buckthorn leaves were quickly stripped from the twigs (we've done some
comparisons, and leaves of Frangulus Buckthorn, Manitoba Maple, American
Elm, and Sugar Maple, in that order, seem to be less preferred). These
piles seem to promote population explosions of the snails in their vicinity.
Back on 27 September I started whacking down Buckthorn shoots that
retained robust green foliage, from felled stumps, in order to see if
the snails would swarm the piles late in the season (it seemed that the
mature plants were shedding their leaves early this year). I did another
pile of shoots on 10 October, and another pile on 17 October. There have
been modest numbers of Cepaea active since then, including a few up on
dry Queen Anne's Lace stems in some surveys, but never more than 2
snails on any of the piles.
I thought that with the past two days having record-breaking 22°C
temperatures, and modest amounts of rain, conditions for swarming the
piles would be optimal, but this morning there were no snails on the
moist piles.
I conclude that they must have a seasonal calendar that tells them when
to go wherever they go to hibernate, and that they've begun to close
down for the autumn by the end of September. I got similar, if less
carefully planned, results from autumnal piles last fall, and next year
I think I'll make weekly piles to see what the pattern might be. These
are snails we imported from London, Ontario, in 1981, so they have
whatever calendar they inherited from there, and something like 20
generations of selective adaptation to the climate-changing Bishops
Mills environment.
fred.
------------------------------------------------------------
Frederick W. Schueler & Aleta Karstad
Fragile Inheritance Natural History - https://fragileinheritance.ca/
6 St-Lawrence Street Bishops Mills, RR#2 Oxford Station, Ontario K0G 1T0
on the Smiths Falls Limestone Plain 44.87156° N 75.70095° W
(613)258-3107 <bckcdb at istar.ca>
------------------------------------------------------------
Over the past three years, Kevin Willey & we have been hacking down
invasive Cathartic Buckthorn on his land E of St Lawrence Street in
Bishops Mills, and we found that the resulting piles of twigs and
foliage were swarmed by the introduced Cepaea nemoralis snails at a
density that we compared to "the Christmas tree of a household that's
inherited ornaments from four grandparental households," and the
Buckthorn leaves were quickly stripped from the twigs (we've done some
comparisons, and leaves of Frangulus Buckthorn, Manitoba Maple, American
Elm, and Sugar Maple, in that order, seem to be less preferred). These
piles seem to promote population explosions of the snails in their vicinity.
Back on 27 September I started whacking down Buckthorn shoots that
retained robust green foliage, from felled stumps, in order to see if
the snails would swarm the piles late in the season (it seemed that the
mature plants were shedding their leaves early this year). I did another
pile of shoots on 10 October, and another pile on 17 October. There have
been modest numbers of Cepaea active since then, including a few up on
dry Queen Anne's Lace stems in some surveys, but never more than 2
snails on any of the piles.
I thought that with the past two days having record-breaking 22°C
temperatures, and modest amounts of rain, conditions for swarming the
piles would be optimal, but this morning there were no snails on the
moist piles.
I conclude that they must have a seasonal calendar that tells them when
to go wherever they go to hibernate, and that they've begun to close
down for the autumn by the end of September. I got similar, if less
carefully planned, results from autumnal piles last fall, and next year
I think I'll make weekly piles to see what the pattern might be. These
are snails we imported from London, Ontario, in 1981, so they have
whatever calendar they inherited from there, and something like 20
generations of selective adaptation to the climate-changing Bishops
Mills environment.
fred.
------------------------------------------------------------
Frederick W. Schueler & Aleta Karstad
Fragile Inheritance Natural History - https://fragileinheritance.ca/
6 St-Lawrence Street Bishops Mills, RR#2 Oxford Station, Ontario K0G 1T0
on the Smiths Falls Limestone Plain 44.87156° N 75.70095° W
(613)258-3107 <bckcdb at istar.ca>
------------------------------------------------------------
I Macaulay
Nov 1, 2024, 11:25:00 AMNov 1
to natur...@googlegroups.com
How was the wind on your test day?
Ian
Senility has been a smooth transition for me.
Note New Hours
Ian Macaulay Carp, Ontario
Open at 11:AM Close at 5:00 PM
45.2397 N long: 76.0991 W Elv 137 M UTMDon't Forget to Save the Stamps
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Fred Schueler
Nov 1, 2024, 11:31:51 AMNov 1
to natur...@googlegroups.com
On 11/1/2024 11:23 AM, 'I Macaulay' via NatureList wrote:
>
> How was the wind on your test day?
simultaneously. One of the things in the doing-the-streets project is
counting the Norway Maple seeds that blow from a tree on Buker Road, and
last night we had more than a hundred of these, which we've never had as
many as a dozen before.
fred.
=======================================
> 6 St-La
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