Awful smell but not dead.

[furrethat97]

Hey guys, I'm a new snail owner. My sisters friend got a mystery snail for me when they couldn't take care of it. I love it a lot but it's enclosure has been smelling really bad.
I heard that when snails die they have a terrible odor, like rotten eggs and the like. That's pretty similar to what I smell.
I was given to it in a jam jar with holes on the lid, and I moved it to a 10 gallon tank (Using a thin material to cover the top) and it continued to smell pretty bad so I moved it back to the jar for now as I clean the tank. I have a small plant in there and I smelled it as well as the snail itself and there is no odor coming from them. When I cleaned the jar it smells good then the day after its back smelling pretty bad. Snail itself is pretty active and eating and sliming around. Does snail poo really smell that bad after one day? Could it be the lack of ventilation or a pest?
Another detail: It had babies when it was given to me and I put them in a tupperware enclosure (with holes of course) and it smells fine.
Thanks for reading. Really hope the best for my snail.

[tigersnail]

Sorry, just clarifying here, mystery snails are aquatic. Did you mean the snail is a mystery because you don't know the species?
About the snail smelling bad, I haven't really experienced this before! It could just be the snails waste that is becoming smelly, but usually I don't find it has much of a smell. The snail itself may have an infection, but I'll let others weigh in too as I'm not sure. Hope it clears up!

[Liguus]

From the description I will assume this is a mystery aka unknown land snail. They shouldn't really be smelling bad.

What kind of soil did you use?

[mutantboy]

Could it be food waste? Rotting plant matter/vegetables/fruit remains that are possibly too small and dirty for you to easily identify? Maybe try a clean up crew if you don't already have one?