Big snail with little snail

[hermyziv]

Hello!

I would like some advice from more experienced and knowledgeable snail enthusiasts than myself.

I have one Helix aspersa who I guess-timate to be around 10 or 11 months old. (S)he has always lived alone, and I feel like my beloved Hermy could benefit from some company.

Today I found a very tiny baby (still mostly transparent), and took it home in hopes that it could prove to be a good friend. I like the fact that it is young; less of a chance that it is infected with mites or the like. Though I have no idea of its type, judging from the other snails in its vicinity, I think it could be a Cepaea nemoralis.

My main question is this: Is it okay to keep this tiny (but highly active) creature in the same habitat as my large-grown Helix aspersa?

And is there anything else I might want to take into consideration before introducing them?

Thank you very much in advance!

[pinkunicorn]

It's ok with the aspersa. The size difference isn't too much.

I remove mites by giving the snail or slug a bath under a running tap. Just make sure the animal closes the breathing hole and then you can rinse it all over. Might take a few washes to get rid of all the mites hiding inside the pneumostome but if gently repeated on a few days it should do the trick.

[hermyziv]

Thank you for the response. Do you think that a snail so young it is still transparent might have mites? I don't have a clue how often baby snails have mites, but I was thinking that if there is not much inside the baby for the mites to feed off of, it might be that there is less of a chance that they'd bother infesting it. What do you think?

[pinkunicorn]

I would guess the age doesn't matter. Not all wild caught snails have mites anyway. To be certain observe the babe under a magnifying glass maybe? Mites are generally easy to spot as they scuttle over the snail's foot and they don't tend to stay inside the snail for long periods. That's why a few rinses rids them as they all come out of hiding sooner or later, I've noticed.