The twelfth in my series of tams inspired by The Magnus Archives, one for each of Smirke’s fifteen fears!
This time: The Buried!
The pattern features coffins, subway trains, graves and, of course, shovels! It’s been one of my favorites so far, even though it wasn’t originally supposed to be the next tam in order.
I met some relatives of my beloved leatherleaf slugs in the mangroves of Singapore, the onch slugs! they’re perhaps some of the slowest-moving animals I’ve ever encountered; this is one in a hurry:
the species pictured is a Platevindex, which are particularly interesting to me since their backs are studded with extra eyes! the dorsal papillae each have a little black dot that’s a photoreceptor, which helps the slug detect changes in light exposure.
onchidiids are marine animals, living on costal rocks and in mangroves, but breathe air and spend much of their time out of the water. like the leatherleafs, they’ve got a dry, tough hide that maintains water balance, but Platevindex takes that to an extreme—when I picked one up, it felt like a vulcanized rubber tire!
ALT
