Last year Ellie and Megan received four stick insects and two African land snails for their birthday. They share a tank and are very simple to care for. The stick insects love to eat either privet or brambles and the snails just need damp coconut fibre as a bedding and eat everything from cucumbers and lettuce to dandelion leaves. They also have a cuttlefish bone that keeps their digestive systems healthy and able to break down the cellulose. 

At the beginning of the Summer holidays this year we found to our surprise that the snails had laid eggs and we were now the proud owners of 51 baby snails. Snails are asexual so either can produce eggs. Ideally (unless you want to be overrun!) you need to find the eggs before they hatch and freeze them so that it kills the embryos. 

Needless to say because of our crazy lifestyle (I clean them out once a week) they had already hatched before I could do that. They are now about seven or eight weeks old and ready to find new homes so I’ve been busy advertising ‘Snails Free to a Good Home!!’ 

Last night after a glass or two of wine with my neighbour I decided to replace the brambles and lettuce and proceeded to throw away the old food stuff. It was after having already thrown two handfuls in the bin that to my horror I realised that there were a second batch of babies all the size of a peppercorn!! Out came the Marigolds and I proceeded to carefully empty the dustbin sieving through tea bags and egg shells to find every last one!! We are now the proud parents of over one hundred snails!! 

 Tomorrow I will be going out to buy a new tank to keep them in and I will be splitting up the adults so we don’t have any more ‘accidents’

So if anyone wants to adopt a snail or two, you know where to come!!