go on, have a guess

[LisaLQ]

Yup - Cooper's grown up enough to have another stab at a guess.

Possibilities are:
Albopicta
Fulica
Smithii
...or a cross of any of these three.

Now up until the last week or so, I've thought he was your common bog standard fulica or fulica cross. Now I'm erring on the side of fulica or smithii, with his yellow stripes - his solid brown colour is becoming more broken up again, so altogether it gives him a lighter appearance than before. He's even developed paler patches in his brown bits, and it isn't shell wear.

Kathy's fella from the same person potentially same batch (would have to check but until then possibly not) is a little bit on the paler side.

Cant for the life of me get a decent look at his columnella, I thought I saw pink for a moment, but I just dont know how to do it without squishing him.

Here's Cooper pics from tonight:




The top one's a little misleading as the majority of the yellow on there is new growth. But I took it at that angle to show you the other yellow stripes further into his shell.

Both Cooper's and Jethro's (Kathy's boy) shells are much rounder and fatter than our (now adult) fulicas weer at that age/size.

And here's Jethro - somewhat lighter and with more light markings. What's interesting about him is that in his brown stripes, he has thin very black lightning stripes that seem a little raised, and are not related to any areas of damage or odd growth. He started off with a lovely red bum (well, tip of shell), more so than Cooper who was pinky orange. Jethro's has just started to fade recently, and you cant tell in the pics that he has a salmony faded pink bum.




Both snails have also got white eyes which looks very odd but I'm sure has nothing to do with this pmsl! ;D

[Kevin]

Can you get a look at his columella? what size is he? if he's a smithii his columella will be pink/purple.

[LisaLQ]

As I said in the original post, I got a small flash of pink before his flesh covered it again - but it might have been my eyes. It's proving to be tricky with both of them, cos we're not used to doing this kind of thing - I thought my two margies were var.marginata because I hadn't pushed far enough back, and they're ma-hoos-ive.

Cooper is about 8cm now, wanna see something shocking? This was him in mid Nov with Sam (roughly 9-10cm):


And now (Sam second in from right, Cooper on his left - bad lighting, makes Cooper look darker):

[Arno]

I still would say it's fulica.

[LisaLQ]

You see, I'd agree if it was just Cooper - but Kathy's one definitely looks albo-ish to me, maybe not all albo, but definitely some in there. He's also got faint ridges, like Monty (my retic) but not as pronounced.

So basically Cooper's a fulica as thought, and Kathy's is....?

If it's anything to go by - they grow extremely quickly - Sam our fulica has never grown like this. Cooper's gone from 3-4cm to 9cm in two months.

[Deleted]

They're both interesting but I'd have to say fulica realistically. i've got a fulica from phoebe that is slightly unusual but for the time being i think we should just put it down to variation, although they could be crossbred somewhere along the line it is possible.

[sonicsnail]

A pretty fulica in my opinion, but, WOW! has he grown!

[LisaLQ]

Yup - just measured them both (Sam and Cooper that is), and Sam hasn't grown at all since I last measured them in November (so I think he's done growing now) and he's 9cm. Cooper is in between 7.5cm and 8cm.

I know he's just a fulica really - that's how I see him anyway, just the odd thing that makes me think otherwise. His yellow streaks remind me of smithii and I saw a smithii on a google search that had the same reddish body, which goes dark at the base of his foot. Of course, body colour is mucho mucho variable before anyone reminds me

I think he's a fulica. Kathy doesn't think hers is. I just like playing "guess the crossbreed". Dont get me started on the dog...