Snail Care - how we keep ours
African Snails: Average Year Round Temperature: 25 - 26*C
Tropical Snails: Average Year Round Temperature: 22 - 25*C
European Snails: Average Year Round Temperature: 5 - 15C in Winter (In Hibernation) 15 - 20C in Summer
All adult snail sizes given on our website are for approximate shell length only.
It will vary slightly for each individual snail, depending on diet, habitat & whether or not they are wild caught or captive bred.
Temperatures & Humidity
To get the correct environment for your snail it is also good to find out what the climate is like in the country of origin
for that particular species - REMEMBER... snails mostly come out at night when it is a bit cooler!
Most species (but not all) will tolerate a slight variance in temperature as long as the humidity levels are right for them.
You may need to spray a fine mist of water a little more or a little less often until the snails are all active, happy and feeding. The Archachatina will prefer slightly more humidity than Lissachatina species and some snails will need extra humidity at certain times of the year to induce breeding.
* Of course, everyone has different views & to make things easier for your new pets to adapt to their new home with you,
PLEASE check with the breeder you are buying snails from regarding the temperature & humidity they are used to.
Substrate & Plants
We prefer to use natural woodland compost and leaf litter as a base as well as home-grown sphagnum moss & added leaves from oak, beech and fruit trees. Most of our snails enjoy eating the various bits & pieces that they find, this helps to create a natural as possible habitat.
Certain species will need it mixed with sand, limestone or volcanic rock dust so please research your chosen species first!
Please check with the breeder you are buying snails from, as some of the more difficult species can find it hard to adapt to a new type of substrate - we keep all of ours on a mix of woodland compost, coco fibre & leaf litter to keep things as natural as possible & give them something to nibble at.
Most of our snail habitats have either Basil, Miners Lettuce, Wild Horseradish, Stinging Nettles or African Violets growing in a bright corner mainly as a food source but also for keeping humidity levels up & providing areas of exploration.
The larger, African species will dig them up & destroy them.
Feeding & Water
Most snails eat a variety of fruit, vegetables, plants & herbs - however, like us, they have their favourites
and you will need to observe their feeding habits to make a list of your own.
Please be aware that as with all animals, their feeding preferences will change from time to time throughout the year
depending on varying nutritional needs such as growth or reproduction.
I do advise that you research your chosen species & try to find out what they would eat in the wild & try keep their diet as natural as possible - it is worth the extra time & effort if you wish to raise healthy animals.
We have found that all of our snails prefer to eat the leaves or flowers from various 'weeds' including burdock, thistles, nettles, dandelions, plantain, groundsel & dock weed so it is worth offering on a regular basis.
Dead & dying plant matter is also a natural part of a snail's diet, not just the fresh stuff
but if you are collecting snail food from the wild, please make sure it has not been sprayed.
This is a basic fruit & vegetable list to get you started:
Aubergine, Apple
Beetroot, Banana, Basil
Cabbage, Carrot, Chard, Courgette, Cucumber
Dandelion, Dock Leaves
Horseradish Leaves
Romaine Lettuce
Marrow, Mango, Melon, Mushrooms, Miners Lettuce
Nettles
Papaya, Parsnips, Peach, Pears, Pepper, Plum, Pumpkin
Raspberries
Strawberries, Squash, Sweetcorn, Sweet Potato, Swede
Turnip
Most Inverts will also enjoy nibbling at the various lichens that can be found - Lichen & Algae are an important & enjoyable food source.
Some slugs & snails enjoy a bath now & again, some larger species may like a plastic cat food bowl as the sides are slighting sloping to avoid tipping, which also makes it easier for them to get in it. Smaller species can make regular use of a milk bottle lid or just a leaf for a drinking place.
Not all snails will want a water supply if they are kept damp & some will just tip it up & turn the substrate into a bog - If this happens stop putting water in for them, just continue to spray the moss & leaf litter instead.
Some of our snails love to bathe in a tortoise dish and with it being fairly flat & heavy they can't tip it over!
Keeping all the eggs from your breeding pair of adult snails can sometimes be disastrous. Giant African land snails are known to be breeding machines - producing hundreds of young at a time and being ready for reproduction as often as every 2-3 months (sometimes more frequent) The best thing to do is to freeze the eggs as soon as they are laid.
As cruel as this may seem, freezing is in fact the most humane way of maintaining population size. Freezing the eggs once they are laid halts their development into snails. The cells literally "stop dividing" - no pain is caused in this process.
Keeping 20-30 snails and raising them to adulthood is a lot of hard work. So even if you are planning on hatching the entire clutch and selling the majority on, its useful to know that in the wild more than 60% of the young don't make it to adulthood. For this reason, adults produce hundreds of young, in hope that few of them will trickle through and survive to breeding age. Predators & disease naturally control the population size. In captivity there is no threat from predators and very little threat of disease. For this reason, snails thrive and can literally flood you with young.
Many thanks to Nell Vladimirovna Kornetova for giving me permission to use this picture.
Raising all the young from a whole clutch of eggs will also result in undersized & unhealthy snails
- there are more than enough of these in the hobby as it is, please do not add to them!
This page is only to tell you how we keep ours, there is lots of information out there & everyone does things differently.
What works for us may not work for you - please research any new pets thoroughly before purchase - wherever you are buying from.