Why do slugs dissolve if you sprinkle salt on them?
In: Biology
Have you ever put salt on an open wound? That’s what is happening to the slug but on their whole body, salt is pulling the water out as their skin does not have so many layers
It doesn’t so much disintegrate the slug as turn the slug inside out through its skin.
It’s the same way you make cole slaw & sour kraut. You add salt to cabbage and it draws the water out of the cabbage. It even ruptures some of the cell walls. So instead of tough & chewy cabbage you end up with soft yet crunchy salty juicy cabbage.
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Crunchy salty juicy slugs don’t go quite as well with beer and hotdogs though.
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They don’t come with a salt-tight skin as you do, so the salt pulls water out of the slug as salt is highly charged and likes to dissolve in water. It does that so gladly that water from the slug moves out on the skin, seemly dissolving the slug. In reality, the dissolving salt is poisonous to the slug and it tries to counteract the salt by producing foamy substances…
Edit: as pointed out, the skin is of course leaky for water, but not salt. My bad for writing that wrong
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