Is a T'u-K'u lurking in the garden?
By Chelsie Vandaveer
May 7, 2003
killerPlants Tendrils: ~~1~~2~~3~~4~~5~~
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Ch'eng-Shih Tu'an lived during the Tang Dynasty. Around 860, he completed his manuscript, Yu-Yang Tsa-Tu. The work mentions an animal called the T'u-K'u.
"It is like a belt in shape....The head is of a flat chisel-shape, and the body has black and yellow folds (patterns?)....If we touch it, the animal will easily separate into several pieces. The animal usually chases earthworms. When the earthworm is captured the animal covers it. The captured earthworm melts within a few hours; its body becomes a syrupy slaver. The animal is poisonous. Chickens that peck the animal die immediately. (translation by Lue and Kawakatsu, 1986, cited in "Bipaliid Land Planarians Recorded in Chinese and Japanese Materia Medica", Gen-yu Sasaki, 2001)
The T'u-K'u [too koo] is probably the land planarian (flatworm), Bipalium kewense Moseley. According to P.M. Choate and R.A. Dunn (1998), it was unknown to Westerners until 1878 when one was discovered in a greenhouse at Kew Gardens. It has since spread to most warm subtropical countries as a result of shipping plants. The T'u-K'u is a voracious predator of slugs, snails, and, unfortunately, earthworms which recycle nutrients. When the T'u-K'u runs out of other species to eat,
it eats its own kind.
Members of the family Terricola, planarians have no skeleton and move by tiny cilia (hairs) on the underside of the body. A thin layer of mucus is secreted to facilitate the movement. They have no respiratory or circulatory systems, oxygen and carbon dioxide diffuses across the external membrane and through the body. Only one opening in the planarian's body serves both as mouth and anus. Ingested food is broken into small pieces which are engulfed in an amoeba-like fashion by the cells lining the gastrointestinal tract.
For all they lack, they do not lack for reproductive organs. They are hermaphrodites having the organs of both sexes. Planarians do not mate with themselves but with others of their species, the female organs lay eggs after mating.
But eggs are not their main mode of reproduction. The creatures mostly reproduce by fragmentation. Every month a piece or two of the tail breaks off and becomes a functioning flatworm after about ten days. ("Land Planarians, Bipalium kewense Moseley and Dolichoplana striata Moseley", Choate and Dunn, 1998, IFAS, UF)
The Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences with the University of Florida has posted an informative article on land planarians by P.M. Choate and R.A. Dunn. To learn more about flatworms and to view photographs, click on the link:
http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/BODY_IN206
killerPlants Tendrils: ~~1~~2~~3~~4~~5~~
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