Slugs are much maligned. Having the temerity to wear their slime on the outside of their bodies, they are about as far removed from our notion of cute and cuddly as is possible without being tapeworms. But they are misunderstood and persecuted beyond necessity – with ecological knock-on effects for the slow-worms, thrushes, hedgehogs, badgers and other animals further up the food chain. True, some slugs will eat your plants, but naturalist Chris Packham recently made a plea for greater tolerance for the mollusc: with that in mind, here are five reasons to admire slugs:

1. Most slugs are scavengers, but that can be handy. They eat that catch-all substrate, “decaying organic matter”, which includes dead and rotting plants; leaf litter; fungoid wood; fallen fruit; animal droppings; carrion; deliquescent toadstools; and mouldering compost. If they sometimes nibble idly at a leaf, it is probably because the leaf is already damaged or diseased.

2. The great grey slug, Limax maximus, is a voracious predator, eating snails (actually the main culprits in the veg patch), worms, maggots and other insect larvae. They are not above cannibalism, which can make it awkward if slugs are kept together as pets.

3. Slug sex is a marvel to behold. Two hermaphrodite slugs meet on a tree branch and secrete a thick rope of extra-viscous slime, down which they gyrate like pole-dancers. Each inflates a huge, pale, flower-shaped penis, which they entwine together, and each slug fertilises the other. All this while dangling in mid-air.

4. Although lacking the protection of a snail shell, slugs make up for any supposed disadvantage by being able to insinuate their smooth, flexible and lubricated bodies down into the tiniest crevices. This makes them truly subterranean creatures, and they can easily push down a metre into the soil.

5. Slugs make easy and accessible educational props to inspire children with the wonder of the natural world. Close up, admire the telescopic eye and feeler stalks on the head; peer into the large breathing hole, or pneumostome, down the right side of the body (like snails, slugs are not bilaterally symetrical); and admire the rhythmic muscular ripples on its belly as a large, moist slug glides smoothly and effortlessly up a sheet of glass.