A snail is, in loose terms, a shelled gastropod.
They have considerable human relevance, including as food items, as pests, and as vectors of
disease, and their shells are used as decorative objects and are incorporated into jewelry.
As they can be found in a very wide range of environments, they're bound to exist in
many varieties.
For that reason, let's take a look at 10 of the most beautiful snails in the world.
Number 10.
The Red Racer Nerite Snail is an extraordinarily beautiful freshwater nerite species that is
native to the Philippines.
It is among the rarest snail species in the aquarium world, so it is very seldom available.
This snail has a highly variable shell appearance, but its many possible patterns are all among
the most attractive of any ornamental freshwater or marine snail.
They are relatively long-lived among its relatives where these snails can live up to 4 years.
As it requires brackish or marine water for its fry to survive, this snail will not proliferate
in a freshwater aquarium and it is not known to have been bred commercially.
Number 9.
The clear or perspective sundial snail is a sea snail found in Indo-Pacific Asia and
around India, where it often lives among coral reefs and enjoys sandy seafloors.
It is an unmistakable snail where the shell coils usually forming a flat disc-shaped with
a flat base.
The spirals are composed of vibrant shades of black, white and brown, while the body
and its tentacles are stripped as well to match the shell.
Even though the clear sundial snail is a common species in its range, it is listed as 'Endangered'
in the Red List of threatened animals of Singapore as the original shores where they were found
have been lost to reclamation.
Number 8.
The candy cane snail is a species of tree-living snail native to the Caribbean.
Typically right-handed with seven or eight whorls, the background of the shell is white
with typically 3–6 spiraling stripes of various colors,
making it look like this snail has been painted on.
Even though it spends most of its life in trees, the candy cane snail descends to lay
its eggs in moist soil, and it consumes various kinds of lichens throughout
its life as well as twigs and small branches.
Number 7.
The red-lined bubble snail is a species of sea snail that occurs in the sublittoral zone
of the Indo-Pacific from Japan to Australia and New Zealand.
With the length of 20mm, this snail has a milky-white mantle with iridescent blue edges,
and shell has a white background with horizontally spiraling red brown bands which are crossed
by vertical bands in the same color.
Unlike many other types of snails, bubble snails cannot fully retract their soft parts
into their shells, so their only defence from predators is great camouflage and a fast getaway.
It is also thought that this snail consumes the toxins of its worm prey and stores it
in its flesh.
This means larger sea creatures will learn pretty quickly that this tiny sea snail makes
a really unpleasant meal.
Number 6.
The Zospeum tholussum is a cave-dwelling species of air-breathing land snail that is very small
with a shell height of less than 2 mm and a width of around 1 mm.
Discovered during a caving expedition in Croatia in 2012, very little is known about this snail,
except that they are completely blind and possess translucent shells with five to six
whorls.
They are also extremely slow-moving and may depend on passive transportation through running
water or larger animals for dispersal.
Number 5.
The emerald green snail or Manus green tree snail is endemic to Manus Island in Papua
New Guinea where it lives in trees and inhabits rain forest areas up to 112 m above sea level.
The shell of this species is a vivid green color, which is unusual in snails.
The green color is however not within the solid calcium carbonate part of the shell,
but instead it is a very thin protein layer known as the periostracum and under the periostracum
the shell is yellow.
The shells of this species were in demand for making jewelry and were popular with shell
collectors.
This, and logging of the rain forest where this species lives have led this species to
be classified as Near Threatened by the IUCN.
Number 4.
Amphidromus is a genus of tropical air-breathing land snails that can be found in Southeast
Asia.
The shells of Amphidromus are relatively large, from 25 mm to 75 mm in maximum dimension,
and particularly colorful and polymorphic.
The genus Amphidromus is unusual in that it includes species that have dextral shell-coiling
and species that have sinistral shell-coiling.
In addition, some species simultaneously include individuals with left-handed and right-handed
shell-coiling which is an extremely rare phenomenon.
Number 3.
The Liguus tree snails live in tropical hardwood hammocks and are sometimes referred to as
living jewels.
Living in southern Florida and the Florida Keys, they come in a huge variety of colors
from white to almost black, wrapped in whorls of various colors.
In the dry season, this snail goes into a form of hibernation where they fasten themselves
to a branch and seal their shells with mucus to prevent dying out.
And when the rains begin again, the water softens the shell and the creature reemerges.
Number 2.
Also known as the purple-ring topsnail, the jeweled topsnail, is a medium-sized sea snail
that lives off of the Pacific coast of North America.
It can be recognized by its brilliantly colored shell, which is lustrous with a gold field
dotted with brown on the spiral rows of grains, the periphery or lower edge of each whorl
encircled by a zone of violet stripes.
The brilliance of the colors fades somewhat once the animal dies.
As a marine snail, the jeweled topsnail is fairly omnivorous, where it feeds seasonally
on kelp, sessile fauna like bryozoans and detritus.
Number 1.
The Cuban land snail or the painted snail, is a species of large, air-breathing land
mollusk that is endemic to Cuba, where they live mainly in coastal habitats
in the subtropical forest.
Reaching a length of about 20 millimetres, these large shells are shiny and very brightly
colored.
Normally they show a bright yellow color with a white stripe, but the species is well known
for its colourful shell polymorphism, with numerous color varieties.
These shells are sought after by poachers and used to make jewelry and trinkets.
As a result, the species has become endangered, and it is a protected species since 1943 by
the Cuban legislation which prohibits the export except for scientific reasons.