Nothing slow about a snail's mind

If you give a marine snail an easy life, it will sit back and think about things. But if you introduce risk into its neighbourhood, it will display some sharp-witted ways.

If you give a marine snail an easy life, it will sit back and think about things. But if you introduce an element of risk into its neighbourhood, it will display some sharp-witted ways, says UPI.

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The risk factor will have it figuring out hunting tricks from a repertoire it has not used in a million years or more.

The surprising behaviour of the humble snail offers insights into evolution, ecology, extinction and intelligence.

The story begins about 1.7 million years ago at the end of the Pleistocene era, when a regional extinction in the western Atlantic wiped out 70 percent of all marine species.

In the sea-grass meadows of the Gulf of Mexico, two marine snails called Chicoreus and Phyllonotus began feeding on clams by slowly drilling through their shell walls.

The two species survived the extinction event, but many of their competitors and predators did not. So they were left with an open field in which to run, if snails could run that is.

To feed, the snails use a body part called a proboscis radula - a tongue with teeth on the end of it - along with a cocktail of chemicals that soften the shells of its prey.

"The teeth then scrape it away," said Gregory Dietl, a postdoctoral researcher at Yale University who has studied the response to the extinction event.