Abstract:

【Objective】 The objective of this paper is to study the behavior of death-feigning in Cathaica fasciola and the effects of some factors such as body weight, temperature, illumination intensity, feeding and starvation on the duration of death-feigning. 【Method】 The effects of body weight, environmental temperature, illumination intensity, feeding and starvation on the duration of death-feigning were studied by touching the two pairs of snail tentacles and the center of head, pressing tail and shell and recording the duration from shrinkage to restoration of the posture of snail body. 【Result】 The death-feigning durations of the examined parts of the snail body increased with the increase of the snail body weight, the illumination intensity and starvation time, but decreased with the decrease of the environmental temperature and the feeding time. The snail body weight correlated highly positively with the duration of death-feigning (P＜0.0001). The death-feigning durations of three groups of snail (groupⅠ,Ⅲ,Ⅴ) under 30-40℃ and fed for 48 h were highly significantly shorter than those under 10℃ and fed for 12 h, respectively (P＜0.01). The death-feigning durations of three groups except the labial tentacles in group V under the lowest illumination intensity (37.8 lx) from electric incandescent lamps were highly significantly longer than those under the highest illumination intensity (4 310 lx) (P＜0.01). Under the same illumination intensity, the illumination from daylight lamps and electric incandescent lamps had different effects on the death-feigning. After being starved for 72 h, the death-feigning durations were highly significantly longer than those for 12 h. 【Conclusion】 After being stimulated, some body parts of Cathaica fasciola can exhibit the death-feigning behavior, the death-feigning durations of the stimulated body parts are related to body weight, temperature, illumination intensity, feeding and starvation.

Key words: Cathaica fasciola, death-feigning, body weight, temperature, illumination intensity, feeding, starvation