New snail! Pacific sideband, possibly half blind.

[littlegoldsnail]

Hi guys! Today I was out by the chicken coop, and my sister happened to find this pacific sideband on a stump. It looked pretty sad when I found it. It’s left eye stock appears to be a little kinked and misshapen, and the left eye looks kinda funny. He acts like he can only see out of his right one. He’s not full grown, but mature. Still rather small for a pacific sideband.

I got a small sterilite, put down a layer of fine dirt, added some rotten wood, leaf litter, a few rocks and some twigs. He seems pretty happy in there. I offered him sweet potato and he refused, so right now I’m seeing if he’ll take some pear.

[Liguus]

Nice find. Doesn't look too deformed to me, so I wouldn't worry about it. Tentacles also double as "feelers" so even if there was some vision impairment it will still get around without much issues.

Sweet potato is a decent option, although ones recently collected form the wild will have to be "trained" to eat it by getting them accustomed to a new food, basically offering it until they try a bite. You can microwave it shortly as well to soften up the sweet potato before feeding. Mushrooms are also a good option to try for Monadenia, along with moistened oats. A typical food I personally use for all my snails is Quicko brand bird food. It's basically enriched grain meal, but when soaked with water it's a good food source. Same with the cereal baby food powder, full of vitamins.

[littlegoldsnail]

The sweet potato was boiled, so it was rather mushy. He does seem to get around fine, he just looks like he uses only one tentacle. I’ll keep watching him.

[Cashell]

Congratz on finding a Pacific sideband! 🐌 It doesn't look too bad, but I hope it can recover to a better state.

[littlegoldsnail]

Update: he seems to be doing well. I think he’s looking better and better all the time. I couldn’t get him to eat the pear, but he loves carrots (as expected, I’ve never had a snail that wouldn’t eat carrot, it’s a favorite with every species I’ve ever kept). I currently have regular carrots, yellow carrots, mushrooms and oyster shell in there, and I’ve seen him eating several times. He also explores. He’s slower then all my other snails, but sidebands seem to all be a little slow. I feel bad I released the Hesperian snail, cause they would have been great tank mates.