Zoo staff rescue near-extinct snails from remote rock

What the report says

BBC World News reported that conservationists from Chester Zoo have bred 300 tiny Madeiran land snails and returned them to Bugio Island, a remote part of Portugal’s Madeira archipelago in the Atlantic. The rescue effort followed the discovery of only 21 of the snails on a rock on the island, a population conservationists believed may have represented the species’ last surviving members.

According to the BBC, the Madeira government asked Chester Zoo specialists to assist with the conservation programme. The snails were bred at the zoo before being taken back to their natural habitat. Zoo staff said the return operation was unusually difficult because the island has no jetty and rough weather left only a short opportunity to land. The team had to enter from the sea, climb onto the rocks and use helmets and harnesses while searching for suitable crevices where the snails could be released.

The BBC cited Tamas Papp, Chester Zoo’s assistant team manager for invertebrates, as saying the team saw the operation as a rare chance to prevent the snails from disappearing altogether. The reintroduction will be followed by monitoring to see how the animals establish themselves in the wild.

The snails are very small, measuring up to about 8mm, but the report noted their ecological role: they feed on vegetation and help enrich soil. More broadly, island species can be especially vulnerable because they often exist in small, isolated habitats, making captive breeding and carefully managed reintroductions important tools when wild populations fall to critically low levels.