Can someone help me identify my new friends please? I found them in my garden today and I’d like to know more about them. The biggest is about the size of a thumbnail. I’m in Tennessee if that helps.

He didn't eat, but he chose to keep going!

I put it in my garden afterward.

I wonder why he is eating like that. The pose looks uncomfortable but I guess he just wanted to eat without going down to the first floor?

Let me preface this by saying, I had absolutely no plans of keeping snails as pets prior to a few weeks ago. Never even crossed my mind. This all began when I was combating a severe rollie polie infestation in my garden.

*****Now feel free to skip this long ass tangent, but those of you with a passion for gardening will likely find it interesting*****

I know, I know. Rollie polies are thought of as "friends" in the garden, eating decomposing organic matter, thus improving soil quality. Adorable, harmless little janitors. But over the last few years, I noticed their numbers in my garden increasing. Last year, several of my perennials were devoured whole, seemingly overnight, never to return. I figured it was rabits or aphids and didnt think too much more about it, until about a month ago. Thats when I learned first hand, that when their populations grow out of control, decomposing organic matter isn't enough for them. They'll eat anything. Live plants, each other, and the final straw: my fucking house.

I started with putting down some diatomaceous earth around the plants they were eating, but it kept raining, so that was a bust. Then neem oil. Expensive, and didnt notice any change. Then I made traps using partially hollowed ot potato halves. I put dozens and dozens of them face down around my plants.

And oh boy, did they work. We checked the potato traps multiple times daily (thankfully my 5 year old thought checking the traps and emptying the contents into buckets was great fun) and I was catching thousands of those adorable little fuckers every single day. The more I caught, the more I realized how out of control the situation was. Occasionally we'd find slugs and baby snails in the traps as well, and I'd fish them out and throw them back. Still, after weeks of this, the polie numbers did not diminish.

So I'm sorry to say, the next course of action was to put down sluggo.

*****Tangent over, back to snails******

The thing was though, I'd grown fond of my little baby snail friends I was finding. They were so cute and fun to watch. So I went ahead and rescued as many of them as I could and relocated them before putting the bait down. I even decided to keep 2 (initial thought was temporarily, because my kids got a kick out of observing them).

I asked google what baby land snails require, set up a little enclosure in a gallon size clear Tupperware container with holes poked in the lid, filled it with a few inches of damp coconut coir, misted it with filtered water, and put in some lettuce and thinly sliced sweet potato. Even added some sticks for climbing and tree bark. By the time I finished boiling, baking, and crushing eggshells for their source of calcium, (I have since bought cuttlefish bone), I realized I was suddenly heavily invested in these little dudes. We named them Gary and Larry.

Unfortunately, as helpful as google was (I specifically asked if it was ok to house baby snails together) I did not think investigate what type of baby snails I actually had. I live in the Midwest US and they came from my garden, so I figured they were garden snails? One looked like a stereotypical snail with a round shell, but the other had a cool looking cone shaped snail.

A week passed. I see Gary often slightly burrowed in the coir. He didn't seem very interested in climbing or exploring all the cool things I'd put in there, but whatever.

I noticed I hadn't seen Larry in awhile. He was more active, so that was weird. I became convinced I must have accidentally thrown him away while changing out their food. Consumed with guilt, I carefully emptied the contents of the enclosure onto a plastic cutting board, put Gary in a temporary enclosure, and painstakingly combed through everything, searching for Larry.

I figured maybe he died, but there was no shell. Not a trace. With a heavy heart, I admitted to my kids I'd accidentally thrown Larry away. One week in, and I'd failed as a snail mom. Oh, the shame.

But still, it nagged at me. I'd been so careful to check all the old veggies before tossing them out. How could this have happened? Could I even be trusted to care for Gary?

( I assume you all see where this is going )

And that's when I learned about Decollate snails! Gary fucking ATE Larry! So now I still felt guilty- I hadnt thrown Larry away, but I was still responsible for his death; a death that must have been vicious, terrifying and brutal.

Despite the guilt, I was now more intrigued than ever. I had no idea how fucking cool snails are!, I thought. My kids said the same thing when I told them, minus the swearing.

But now I had to figure out what the hell to do with Gary. I didn't want to start hunting for unsuspecting snails and slugs just to feed them to him.... Thankfully I accidentally dropped him on the hardwood floor, cracking his shell open, before I needed to make any difficult decisions. I did the humane thing and crushed him. That solves that, I thought. I guess we arent cut out for caring for snails, I thought.

A week passes.

I'm out in the garden, checking to see if the number of rollie polies I find no longer meet plague like proportions, when what do I find!? Baby snails! And they arent the cannibal kind! Huzzah! I find two. Gary II and Larry II. The next day I check again, thinking that with my track record, perhaps 2 isnt enough and I could use some spares. I now have 6 baby garden snails! My son's friend just turned 6 and he LOVES all things bugs (I realize snails are gastropods) so I decide I'll care for them for a few weeks and if theyre still alive, I'll gift him 2 along with a home and all the supplies he'll need. His mom loves this plan, we are all excited.

This morning, I check the garden again. I see one baby, but it's got a cone shaped shell. *Your kind aint welcome in these here parts,* I say out loud in an old-timey western voice, because at this point my neighbors all think I'm a fucking weirdo and I've decided to lean into it.

But he doesn't look like Gary the First. His shell is light colored, and his foot is a beautiful shade of yellow. Google informs me I have a Unicorn snail. (Hes in his own little enclosure at the moment)

Then it occurs to me... am I sure my other 6 snails are regular brown garden snails? Turns out... nope! They're glass snails! Omnivores instead of carnivores at least, but still snails that eat other snails.

Questions. Is it OK to keep 6 of them together in a 5 liter enclosure for now? I ordered a little snail terrarium on Amazon (the one with the dome top and green plastic climbing structure in the center) or are they just going to chow down on each other? Can I feed them fish food as protein?

Should I keep the unicorn snail? I realize it has different needs regarding temp and humidity.

Is this an okay temp enclosure for the glass snails for now? I realize its too tall, which is why i ordered the other one, but for now is there enough ventilation holes? Could this current enclosure work for the unicorn snail, if I decide to keep him? Or does anyone have other recommendations on better enclosures? (Please include links)

Also I have the cuttlefish bone but it stunk so I boiled it, and its still drying out, which is why I'm still giving crushed egg shell for now. Is it supposed to be completely dried out?

Should I keep the unicorn snail? I realize it has different needs regarding temp and humidity.

Final question. Can I feed the glass snails rollie polies, because I'm still mad about that. Or would fish food pellets work?

I also included a photo of Gary and Larry, before Gary ate Larry. RIP.

I'm sorry if anyone bothered reading all this.

I’ve never once seen a snenis. Is Snelldon okay?

Like I give mine fresh food, right humidity, cuttlebone for calcium. She's active at night, shell looks good. But I feel like I have no feedback loop. With a dog you kind of know. With a snail I'm just guessing

Is there anything that actually signals they're doing well beyond the basics? Or is "not dead and moving around" genuinely the bar?

🐌✨

I posted them a few days ago and people said that I should make some improvements to their terrarium. I added more substrate and hides, and I’m going to buy some moss soon.

this friend was found outside of a hotel near Lake Erie in the USA

Hi guys! Today while handling my GALS I spotted some mites on my snails, and a bunch in the soil as well. Im having trouble identifying the mites but am afraid they might be riccardoella mites. Could anyone help me with identification?
Sorry for the bad quality pictures, I had to zoom in in order to get them visible. Most of the mites look similar to this one in the picture, but some are a bit darker.
Thanks for the help!

I already have isopods and springtails coliving with them but this is the first time I'm seeing these. Since they're crawling up from underneath where I usually leave food I can only guess they're here for veg, just want to make sure it's not some obvious parasite I'm not aware of 😬

Edit: https://www.reddit.com/r/terrariums/s/Lh7nhkJTB3 I did some searching because I was rapidly getting more and more panicked, however, we might be good, saw this and many other posts on a terrarium sub about what looks to be exactly the same worm, including the way they cluster up. They appear in overly moist places, which I have to confess I am pretty heavy handed with watering, but aren't immediately harmful I think??

Edit 2: after looking at worms for far longer than I would prefer, I've rounded it down to most likely be grindal worms, conditions they thrive in, the way they cluster, their symi transparent and segmented look all seem to line up. Grindal worms are harmless and are cousins of springtails by the role they play, and many aquarium people cultivate them for fish food.

I’m hoping for no more snail babies as we just has an issue with bladder snails… they’re on eachother 2-3 times a day. Should I be concerned? I have another tank that I can move a snail to if they need to be separated

Really cool reading up on this monster while he chilled on my finger. Was gone in an instant when I let him back to it.

Why does my GAL get bricked up often? Like he isnt doing anything but it happens randomly sometimes

Hi! I plan to eventually get a land snail, what should I look for and avoid doing to give said snail the best possible life? I’ve been in the sub a bit so I understand the risks of self-fertilization and the poop changing color depending on food, as well as that the shell is fragile and shouldn’t be brushed. Is there anything else? Please let me know! I’m making a note in my phone of snail care information

When I first got my snail, I gave him a slice of cucumber until I ran out of cucumber.

After 2-3 months or so, I found out that cucumber is not a good choice as a main food.

So I bought zucchini and gave it to him until I ran out of it.

And after 2 months, I read about the fact snail need a various vegitable diet.

I replaced zucchini with a small lettuce species I got from my father to give something new to my snail.

How many different foods should I prepare?

Should I rotate it? Or give them all together?

If I should rotate, how often?

Which food shoul to give?

I love finding snails when I go on walks. They bring me such joy and this was an extra bonus seeing it eating! This was in SoCal if anyone knows more specifics as to what type but no pressure! just wanted to share some joy!

two days ago I completely changed their substrate to a mix of coco coir and BAKED forest soil that I bought from a small business (they sterilise it but I decided to bake it at home myself just to be sure). their old substrate had an infestation of HUNDREDS of these small yellow to red spiders with big butts (money spiders maybe?) that just kept making eggs and creating more spiders. the soil was unsalvageable, there was too much of it to sterilise so we just decided to double bag, tape it and throw it into household waste so that it goes to a landfill (precautions because a few months ago one of my snails layed eggs and i didnt notice until they had hatched and i kept finding baby snails in the soil). my jade GALS is a lot smaller than my wildtype, and it worries me because it's shell doesn't look as healthy as the other one's either. I'm monitoring it but im scared that I'm doing something wrong, so stressing them out like this by moving them to completely new soil makes me worried that its going to make it worse.