Jauhn Etienne Villaruel

A rare New Zealand snail has been filmed for the first time squeezing an egg from its neck, delighting scientists trying to save the critically endangered meat-eating mollusc. Photo by Lisa Flanagan /New Zealand Department of Conservation/AFP/File

Article (news)

Agence France-Presse

<div><span class="fr-img-caption fr-fic fr-dib" style="width:950px"><span class="fr-img-wrap"><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1746682903209Screen Shot 2025-05-08 at 1.41.10 PM.png" style="width:950px" class="fr-fic fr-dib"/><span class="fr-inner" style="text-align:left">A rare New Zealand snail has been filmed for the first time squeezing an egg from its neck, delighting scientists trying to save the critically endangered meat-eating mollusc. <em>Photo by Lisa Flanagan /New Zealand Department of Conservation/AFP/File</em></span></span></span></div><p>SYDNEY, Australia — A rare New Zealand snail has been filmed for the first time squeezing an egg from its neck, delighting scientists trying to save the critically endangered meat-eating mollusc.</p><p>Threatened by coal mining in New Zealand&#x27;s South Island, a small population of the Mount Augustus snail was transplanted from its forest habitat almost 20 years ago to live in chilled containers tended by humans.</p><div><a href="https://www.abs-cbn.com/news/11/02/22/filipino-scientist-pioneers-research-on-venomous-marine-snails">Meet the Filipino scientist who pioneered research on venomous marine snails, transformed neuroscience</a></div><p>Little is known about the reproduction of the shellbound critters, which can grow so large that New Zealand&#x27;s conservation department calls them &quot;giants of the snail world&quot;.</p><p>A conservation ranger said she was gobsmacked to witness a captive snail laying an egg from its neck -- a reproductive act well documented in other land snails but never filmed for this species.</p><p>&quot;It&#x27;s remarkable that in all the time we&#x27;ve spent caring for the snails, this is the first time we&#x27;ve seen one lay an egg,&quot; conservation ranger Lisa Flanagan said this week.</p><div><a href="https://www.abs-cbn.com/spotlight/10/06/20/new-snail-subspecies-discovered-at-masungi-georeserve">New snail subspecies discovered at Masungi Georeserve</a></div><p>&quot;We caught the action when we were weighing the snail. We turned it over to be weighed and saw the egg just starting to emerge from the snail.&quot;</p><p>Conservation department scientist Kath Walker said hard shells made it difficult to mate -- so some snails instead evolved a special &quot;genital pore&quot; under their head.</p><p>The Mount Augustus snail &quot;only needs to peek out of its shell to do the business,&quot; she said.</p><p>The long-lived snails can grow to the size of a golf ball and their eggs can take more than a year to hatch.</p><p>They eat earthworms, according to New Zealand&#x27;s conservation department, which they slurp up &quot;like we eat spaghetti&quot;.</p><div><a href="https://www.abs-cbn.com/life/02/11/21/earliest-shell-horn-played-for-first-time-in-17000-years">Earliest shell horn played for first time in 17,000 years</a></div><p>Conservation efforts suffered a drastic setback in 2011, when a faulty temperature gauge froze 800 Mount Augustus snails to death inside their climate-controlled containers.</p><p>Fewer than 2,000 snails currently live in captivity, while small populations have been re-established in the New Zealand wild.</p><div><strong>© Agence France-Presse</strong></div><div><strong>RELATED VIDEOS</strong></div><div><strong><span class="fr-video fr-deletable fr-fvc fr-dvb fr-draggable" contenteditable="false" draggable="true"><iframe width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/AWgBM4ZRj7Y?&amp;wmode=opaque&amp;rel=0" frameBorder="0" allowfullscreen="" class="fr-draggable"></iframe></span></strong><span class="fr-video fr-deletable fr-fvc fr-dvb fr-draggable" contenteditable="false" draggable="true"><iframe width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/r-zPOZyjfqA?&amp;wmode=opaque&amp;rel=0" frameBorder="0" allowfullscreen="" class="fr-draggable"></iframe></span><br/></div>

<p>A rare New Zealand snail has been filmed for the first time squeezing an egg from its neck, delighting scientists trying to save the critically endangered meat-eating mollusc.</p>

A rare New Zealand snail has been filmed for the first time squeezing an egg from its neck, delighting scientists trying to save the critically endangered meat-eating mollusc.

What the shell: Scientists marvel as rare snail lays egg from neck

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What the shell: Scientists marvel as rare snail lays egg from neck

Agence France-Presse

Published May 08, 2025 01:58 PM PHT

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