The other night I was supposed to be doing the clearing up while John put Izzy to bed.  I popped over the road to post some letters, it was pouring it down.

On the way to the post box…..ooh a cool snail, I’m having that.

On the way back from the post box….ooh another cool snail, might as well have that one as well.

I appeared back in the kitchen and wondered what to do with my two new friends.  When John came down no clearing up had been done and I had two snails in an old takeaway tub.  One of them was a bit feisty.  That was annoying on two counts:

Firstly, it kept trying to escape. ‘What don’t you like being in an old Jalfrezi tub with some floppy lettuce out of my fridge?!’

Secondly, it kept wriggling way out of it’s shell when I was trying to figure out whether it had got an umbilicus (a funny little hole some snails have at the back of their shells).  ‘Get in your shell snail! Aren’t you supposed to be frightened of me?!’

That one I think was a juvenile Cepaea hortensis.  Ah a teenager, that explains it!

The other one was much more compliant and was one of the exciting limestone specialists you get around here.  It appeared to be Candidula intersecta.  

I imagine that suddenly finding yourself in a strange place being prodded and having bright lights directed at you can be compared to an alien abduction.

Sorry I didn’t take photos of the real snails (got carried away and forgot about the blog).  I hope Barry and Barbara will do.

Cheerio for now.

P.S.  The FSC AIDGAP guide to ‘Land Snails in the British Isles’ is excellent.