Retracted snail

[misscapel]

Hi,

I have two young Giants African Land Snails. One is about 1.5 inches long and the other (unrelated) is only about half an inch. They both like to bury themselves pretty deep in the coir substrate so it's not unusual to not see them for a couple of days, especially the smaller one. However, a couple of says ago I realised I hadn't seen the smaller one for a while so I dug it out, and saw that its shell was clogged with substrate. I washed it out and the snail's body was so far retracted that I couldn't see it. The shell felt very light and fragile, and I was pretty sure that it must be dead.

However, I left it in the tank overnight just to be sure and the next day found it on the other side of the tank, but again retracted so far that I couldn't see any body at all. The next night I left it on a cabbage leaf and kept an eye out, and sure enough did see it come out of its shell and crawl around a bit. But it has now retreated back and doesn't seem to have moved all day despite being left on a cabbage leaf.

Any ideas what's up with it? I'm guessing it is not a happy snail and probably not much longer for this world, if it hasn't already carked... But any ideas why, or if there's something I could do? Is it likely to infect the other, bigger snail? Any help appreciated!

[pinkunicorn]

Heya,

That does sound like the snail isn't feeling very good. What kind of conditions does your tank have? Humidity, temperature? You could try increasing both and see if it has any effect. Also, you could try offering some soaked fish food to try to attract the sick snail to eat. You could also try some other delicious foods, like cucumber and different fruits.

It's hard to say whether or not it will infect the others, as the cause is unknown. Most often things like this will not affect the others, though. Some individuals are weaker than others and would die regardless. Yours aren't very old yet, judging by size. Has the snail lost weight, like is his body smaller than he used to be?

[misscapel]

Well I think it has truly given up the ghost now, no signs of life at all for over 36 hours.

In terms of whether this one has always been weedy, these are my first snails so I'm not sure how big their bodies are supposed to be when their shells are that small but I guess this one did look a little underweight. It didn't seem to grow much in the 2 months I had it either. So maybe the signs were there... I bought them as classroom pets for my Year 1 class, luckily I haven't taken them in yet or I would have some explaining to do! Shame, it was a really pretty little albino thing too. Maybe the albinism has something to do with it being on the weak side? The other one seems to be doing fine anyway, so hopefully that one will make it into school soon. Thanks for your help!

[pinkunicorn]

RIP little snaily.

There are albino lines with good genes and long lifespans, but some snails just don't make it no matter how good genes they have.