a little miracle: saved from gut extrusion

[Selena]

i have two Balteata adults and one of them is not eating very well since the day i got her, she looked a bit skinny and when she ate it took hours and hours to eat a piece of 1 cm. This summer she began to eat less and got very inactive. she was sleeping a lot and lost weight and she began to look skinny and weak. when she was awake she ate sometimes a bit but this proces took hours. something seemed wrong with her radula, although i couldn't see it from the outsite.

when she was moving de backside of her body was not sticking on the glass like the frontpart of her body and often she just feld from the lid or wall, her shell became too heavy for her little body. her condition kept being bad and there wasn't any improvement. if she was eating, she only wanted to eat mango en coocked carrot. until previous month. I gave her coocked poteto and noticed she liked it, i saw she had problems with rasping and she was able to suck te coocken poteto into her mouth, though it was still very slow but she eat more and more everyday.

she ate coocked poteto for about a weak everyday and woke up twice a day to eat, and eat and eat, when she was awake she was only eating and had a poo dayly. her bocy was still weak and a part was hanging whilst Climbing. after a weak she began to eat other things i rasped or coocked like carrot, pere, apple, sweet poteto, cuttlebone pasta etc she was still eating slow but soon she began to increase weight, looked more relax, happy, active and whilst Climbing she could use her full body again.

I was so happy and proud of her, i was so worried about her health for months and finally she seemed to recover!! 

yesterday i gave her coocked poteto and rasped bean (like she eat many times before) and she was eating like everyday for hours and now and then she feld a sleep in her food, finally she moved to a piece of wood and after a few minuts i checked if she was okay and what i saw scared the hell out of me... i immediately recognised it: gut extrusion! she was out of her shell and hanging a bit forwards with a big craw (as twice as big as her head) with white-ish stuff and much liquid in it came out of her mouth, her radula (the orange rasp teeth) was completely exposed en was like hanging to wards the craw. drups of transparent brown liquied came out of the craw and her face.

i was completely upset and crying, i was convinced she was going to die now. i searched on this forum for pictures and saw many about gut extrusion and it looked exactly the same. once i red about a treatment but i couldn't find it anymore.

i didnt wanted to gave her up or euthenise her directly, after hours i found the experience of snails who surveived gut extrusion and the treatment.

i sterelized a few needles, spoons and cottonbuts, picked Manga out of the tank, hold her in my hand and began to punch with the needle in the craw, i was hard to came though the membrane but i did and more brown-transparant liquied came out of the craw. i tried to pull more out of it with a cottonbut. The craw looked less swolen. then i tried to push it carefully back in her mouth with a spoon but it was way too big and Manga began to move strange with her eyestalks.

i desited not to force it and i hoped she was able to fix it herselfe. i put her back in her own tank with substrate and wood (so i didn't sterelize the environment or removed the substrate) i but her slightly straight agains her piece of wood (in order to prevent her from laying with her body on the craw)

Then she moved her head in the direction of her shell (as if she wanted to retract) she didn't retract and her head moved slightly backwards/ ahead and then the miracle happened: she sucked the hole craw back into her mouth, it went slow and i saw it moving under her skin, when a small piece left out of her mouth she retracted  her head into her shell and after 30 minutes she came out with a strange looking, face and swollen mouth, under the skin of  her head was moving something in the direction of her body, then her genital began to move and rise and her face began to look less swolen and strange. Her head looked like the head of a pitbull (dog) and she just sat like that for a while, moving with her eyestalks, she was awake and seemed alert.

i went to sleep (it was 2 a clock am)

and this morning...... i woke up very early and immediately checked how Manga was doing today. I couldn't believe my eyes: everything turned back to normal !!!!!!!! she was still sitting on the same place, her face looked normal and a few minutes later she produced  a big and normal poo!!!

I still can't believe it and i really hope it's stays normal now, i keep watching her closely but i wanted to share this story definetaly over here!! My lovely manga surveived gut extrusion!!! there's a change in case of gut extrusion

[etana]

Wow, thanks for posting. I hope Manga continues to improve.

[crucify]

blimey, that's an amazing recovery. what part of the snail is the craw exactly, aka where did you enter the needle? i'd love to document this method on my site and hopefully save more snails from this since i've never heard of a cure before

[mangoandlemon]

Wow nice job! Manga is lucky to have such a great owner!

[etana]

crucify : I think this is what Selena was looking for originally. It describes how you puncture the craw, and then if possible, put it back inside the snail with the narrow end of a coffee spoon or similar little tool. It seems some snails are able to swallow the punctured craw back in by themselves.

petsnails.proboards.com/post/116041/thread

I'm not sure why the instructions suggest not having any soil in the tank where the snail can rest from this, since soil is so important for their gut function.

[Selena]

Hi everyone,

Thanks all and thanks etana for the link, that's what i was searching, it's just a way how that person thought what was the best, i made my own variation on it. i did not push the gut back in her body, i tried it but i feld she would be able to do it herself and if she wasn't i could have tried it anyway the next day.
i agree as well about the soil, i've read somewere gut extrusion cauld be caused by a bacterial imbalance so if that's the cause i don't think it's helpfull to remove it all.i think snails need less hygiëne than people do, even with surgery, but that's my opinion.

i punched with the needle on several places untill the liquid came out. She didn't respond on it so it wasn't painfull i guess. i mean with craw the part of gut that's hanging out of the mouth.

i realy hope she keeps doing well, but it could come back. Today she was pretty active, i thought she would be exhausted and weak but she wasn't, she made a nice poo wich is amazing because it contained the food that she ate right before the gut came out... so it's still working normal

i keep posting about the developement and hopefully it's positive

[etana]

I just wonder how you were sold a snail who was ill from day one. Did something happen on the way to you, or was she already doing badly in the snail store?   

[chompie]

Hi Selena - that's an incredible story - thanks for sharing it. Hope your snail keeps on getting better.

[astana]

It's wonderful that Manga is feeling better now.