Pet garden snails unwanted egg laying

[ainge]

Hi

My daughter is keeping three pet garden snails. They have laid eggs and if they hatch we would like to release the baby snails back to the garden. Is this ok to do? If so at what snail age would be best? We're worried that the snails won't have learnt how to fend for themselves in the wild, or protect themselves.

Any advice hugely appreciated!

Thanks 

[morningcoffee]

Jun 27, 2020 9:11:53 GMT ainge said:

Hi

My daughter is keeping three pet garden snails. They have laid eggs and if they hatch we would like to release the baby snails back to the garden. Is this ok to do? If so at what snail age would be best? We're worried that the snails won't have learnt how to fend for themselves in the wild, or protect themselves.

Any advice hugely appreciated!

Thanks 

If the snails are naturally found in your area then it would be fine to release the babies. You can release them whenever you like but if you want to give them the best chance of survival you could keep them for a month or two with good food and calcium so that they can grow good strong shells.
Snails don't "learn" how to survive or anything like that so there is no issue with releasing captive-bred snails.

[ainge]

That is such a relief! Thanks for replying