It's Real: Attack of the Giant African Land Snails in Florida
Posted by Unknown in News, Pest and Parasites, Snail, USA on Monday, 13 May 2013
By Joe Sutton, CNN
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| Giant African land snails can carry a human parasite called rat lungworm, which is a form of meningitis and potentially deadly. |
(CNN) -- Florida, already threatened with sinkholes, now has a new terror: rat-sized, tire-puncturing snails.
Sounding like
something out of a 1950s B-movie, these giant African land snails eat
their way through some surprising stuff, including stucco, plastic
recycling bins, signs and more than 500 species of plants, says the
Florida Department of Agriculture.
Their calcium shells bear pointy edges that are sharp enough to blow out tires of vehicles that run over them.
Agriculture
Department spokeswoman Denise Feiber says the menacing creatures also
carry a human parasite called rat lungworm, which is a form of
meningitis and potentially deadly.
So far, no
human cases have been reported in Florida, Feiber says. But some giant
African land snails that have been captured in the state have carried
the parasite.
The snails are
isolated to the Miami-Dade County area, says Feiber. Experts don't know
exactly how they were first introduced to the United States. It's
thought they may have hitched rides aboard incoming travelers' luggage.
Or some of them may have been intentionally carried into the country as
pets -- and then released.
The snails have
another trait in common with rats: They can multiply very rapidly --
and grow to adulthood in a year, Feiber says. The snails can produce up
to 1,200 eggs per year, and they can live up to nine years.
Since
agriculture officials first discovered the snail invasion in 2011,
trappers have collected more than 117,000. Officials are hoping to
prevent a worst-case scenario, where the snails would threaten Florida
crops.
Some countries, such as Ecuador and Barbados, have run out of resources to fight these critters, Feiber said.
