SYDNEY, Australia (Reuters) — A baseball-sized snail with an insatiable appetite has been seized and destroyed by Australian officials, who said it posed a significant threat to local agriculture.
The animal was found creeping across a Brisbane shipping container yard and identified as a giant African snail, an East African pest capable of growing up to 30 centimetres long and one kilogram in weight.
It is known to eat 500 species of crops, fruits, native Australian plants and even other giant African snails, according to an Australian government website.
“Giant African snails are one of the world’s largest and most damaging land snails,” said Paul Nixon, the agriculture department’s acting regional manager.
The snail can lay 1,200 eggs a year, tolerates extreme temperatures and has few natural enemies in Australia. It also carries parasites that can infect humans with meningitis, which can be fatal.
The last major Australian outbreak of the snail was in 1977, when 300 giant snails were exterminated.
