More than a gift of quick thrills, The gift of snails.

After many weeks of laborious efforts, my English pond snails have finally reproduced! My snail decanter was full of baby snails last week, and I decided to put a small tank together for M at the front desk.

When giving the gift of snails I like to remind my friends that not only are they receiving a gift of hours of fun and excitement, but also a small piece of our collective culture as human beings. Here are 3 fun snaily facts (snacts) I like to surprise my friends with.

1) Did you know that in Michelangelo’s Moses, Moses is pictured with a snail’s ‘horns’ and snaily demeanor?
2) Even as late as 1975 approximately 40% of Oceana residents still believed that the earth and its residents were balanced on the back of a giant snail. This cosmic mollusk was believed to consume entire worlds with a lick of its tongue.
3) In the ancient Navajo creation myth, snail girl was celebrated above all other animal spirits. According to the Navajo when the earth was created snail girl brought water from the underworld in her shell for streams, lakes, and glaciers. A pretty shoddy case for water conservation, even for a 10 thousand year old civilization, but a testament to mankind’s fascination with the snail none the less.


For more information on snails and their lofty postion in our religious history visit this great site! http://www.godchecker.com/gotw/012_holy_snail.php