Ernie Cowan's Outdoors column
Think of a world where your travels are measured in inches rather than miles per hour.Life slows down, it seems, when you spend time watching snails. Call it a terrestrial version of an aquarium.Leaving the house on a sunny morning, I had noticed a network of silvery squiggles on the sidewalk but hadn’t given it much thought until I spotted a snail parked in the middle of the sidewalk at the end of his squiggly path.
Scientists have discovered that a snail’s pace is slow, averaging a blazing rate of about 40 inches per hour. But the reality is, they are here and have become part of our ecological fabric, providing food for a variety of wild creatures, including birds, rodents, fish, toads, crabs and insects.I have often watched our Mt. Hoo roadrunners foraging in the thickets of a sumac bush and emerging with a snail that they break open by pounding on a rock.
Snails do not shed their shells, but produce calcium during their life that allows the shell to expand as they grow larger. I mean, have you ever had a face-to-face conversation with a snail? They seem curious, with their four tentacles that always seem busy keeping track of things around them. Their lower tentacles are near the mouth with sensors to help identify food and objects they contact.
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