Giant African Snail Threat In America

We live in perilous times, a time when we are constantly reminded, especially at airports in the United States -- that today's world contains foreign and domestic threats. Yet, many travelers don't understand that they too can pose a threat in terms for assisting foreign hitchhikers.

There are several agricultural pests invading our country, but one of the most invasive dangerous of them is the Giant African snail (Arachactina aculica). Additionally, it's snail cousins -- the giant Ghana Tiger snail (Achatina achatina) and the Banana Rasp snail (Archachatina marginata) are of great concern to many Departments of Agriculture in various states.

Many scientists around the world, consider the Giant African Snail(Achatina fulica) to be the most damaging of land snails.

It has a big appetite, documented to eating at least five hundred different kinds of plants. It is of particular threat to peanut, beans, peas, cucumbers, and melons of all kinds.

Additionally, if it's preferred fruits and vegetables are not available, the snails will eat a wide variety of household and garden ornamental plants. More shocking is the fact, is that it will also eat tree bark, and even the paint or stucco covering your house.

The story begins in the facts. Giant African snails are world travelers, with the help of mankind, or in this case, boy kind. They hitchhiked to the Indo-Pacific basin, including the Hawaiian Island years ago.

They've even found refuge in the Caribbean islands. Clear back in 1987 they were suddenly found on the island of Martinique and quickly spread from there to the islands of Basse-Terre and Grande-Terre in Guadeloupe within two short years. Thirteen years later, Saint Lucia and the Barbados had also been infested with these snail pests.

South Florida, however, has it's own Giant African snail horror story. Fifty years ago, a Miamai, Florida boy snuck three Giant African snails after a vacation in Hawaii. As boys often do, he grew tired of his new pets when the novelty wore off. His grandmother got tired of feeding and cleaning up after them, so she turned them loose in her garden.

By the time the boy graduated from high school, nearly twenty thousand adult Giant African snails were found, along with thousands and thousands of their eggs. It cost the state of Florida over one million dollars and ten years to get rid of them. There were so many of them that people could actually hear the crunch of their shells beneath their tires when traveling at night.

So, how big does a snail have to get to be a giant among snails? Not terribly big in terms of human imagination -- just about eight inches long and five inches

At adulthood, the Giant African snail has about eight whorls on it's shell, a very long and fleshy swollen body. The shell itself has darker brown lengthwise strikes, generally on the lower part or lower half of the shell.

These snails have both female and male reproductive parts and just in one mating session can have up to five hundred eggs. Since they reproduce several times a year, on average three times a year (without ever mating again), it is easy to see why they can quickly become an invasive army once introduced to an area.

In their normal habitats, they are primarily found in tropical and subtropical regions. However, don't be fooled, so adaptive are they that they can withstand winter weather even in the United States.

Native to Ghana, Africa these snails can be among the biggest of all land snails, measuring as much as eight inches long, and four inches in diameter.

They are prolific in terms of laying eggs, each and every one of them, commonly laying twelve hundred eggs a year. It's because of their rapid population explosions that they can quickly become an invasive species. Considering that they can live and reproduce for up to ten years, this is a huge problem.

They are well-known for eating virtually any plant life they encounter and very much an agricultural threat wherever they are found in the wild. In some places in Africa there are literally nearly two hundred of them per every ten feet.

Commonly known as the West African Land snail, the Banana Rasp Snail (Archachatina marginata), are the gourmets of the giant snail varieties.

They prefer bananas and mangoes (and other soft fruits), but like their cousins will eat just about any plant known on earth. It is estimated that they will eat one fourth of their body's weight every twenty-four hours.

Back in 1992, these snails, the size of a soft-ball, were found to be illegally sold as pets from Nigeria in New York, forcing officials to track down a thousand of them, that had been shipped all over the country.

In case you are wondering where the word "rasp" comes into their name, the reason is that they use tongue (radula) that has several hundred teeth.