If not thousands. They are not the common brown garden snail but a little white snail about quarter the size of the brown snail. The type that you often see on fence posts. But don't let their size fool you into a false sense of security. They maybe small but they eat a lot. I have to mulch heavily because of the sandy soil so I am giving the little buggers a prefect hiding place. They eat anything that is nice, eg vegies, fruit trees, basically anything that I like and am watering. Would love to have ducks but at the moment that isn't a goer. Any suggestions? Also much as I don't like it at the moment i am using snail bait. Does anyone know how bad it is for the environment and anyways of decreasing its "badness".
Never actually seen them out of their shells, but yes that pretty much looks like them, The picture of them on the fence post definitely looks like them
Had another good look at them and yes they are the white garden snail. So Now i know their name, but from the article it sounds as if they are not easy to get rid of. Maybe i have to become the mad smashing lady and go round attacking all my fence posts, because that is one place that they inhabit in very large numbers
The edited volume of Barker (2004) is the major comprehensive source of information. The various chapters that mention T. pisana deal with avian and mammalian predators (Allen, 2004), carabid beetles (Symondson, 2004), Diptera (Coupland and Barker, 2004), other gastropods (Barker and Efford, 2004), reptiles (Laporta-Ferreira and da Graça Salomão, 2004) and nematodes (Morand et al., 2004). The information in the Natural Enemies table comes from these sources, unless otherwise referenced. Although the greatest part of the literature on mollusc-associated Diptera concerns the Sciomyzidae (Coupland and Barker, 2004), there is no mention in Barker (2004) specifically of T. pisana being attacked by sciomyzids; the information provided is derived from Knutson et al. (1970), Coupland (1994, 1996), Coupland et al. (1994), Coupland and Baker (1995), and Baker (2002). The facultative predatory snail Rumina decollata, native to the Mediterranean region, has been used as a biological control agent against T. pisana (Anonymous, 1987), although the author has found no report as to whether the two species interact in their native range (R Cowie, University of Hawaii, USA, personal communication, 2009). Specifically regarding T. pisana, Charwat, Davies, Coupland, Baker and colleagues have done extensive searches for natural enemies with a view to the possibility of biological control in Australia (e.g. Coupland, 1994, 1995, 1996; Coupland and Baker, 1994, 1995; Coupland et al., 1994; Charwat and Davies, 1997, 1998, 1999). In many cases, notably concerning insects and nematodes, it has often not been clear whether the “predator” or “parasite/parasitoid” in fact attacks living organisms or only feeds on those already deceased.