site.btaExhibition of Giant Live Snails Opens at Plovdiv Regional Museum of Natural History

An exhibition of live giant snails can viewed between April 29 and May 1 at the Regional Museum of Natural History in Plovdiv. Visitors will see real giants among land snails and will get acquainted with the features and biology of over 20 species, the owner of the collection, biologist Rostislav Trayanov, told BTA.

Trayanov has been breeding different types of snails for 20 years. “In the last few years, the hobby has developed and new collectors and new species from Africa have appeared, and I have resumed collecting them,” the biologist said. He currently has 60 species, the largest of which are the so-called Achatina. Most of the snails in the exhibition are African, there are several South American, Central American, island and giant slugs, said Trayanov. According to him, the giant snails are tropical and need very high humidity and temperature, as 20 degrees is the lower limit of the average temperature at which they thrive.

There are about 700 people in Bulgaria who own snails, and there are 15 dedicated collectors, the biologist said. According to him, these mollusks live from three to 10 years, and some of them reproduce only once. “I raise offspring of almost all species, because their generation must be maintained,” Trayanov explained.

Snails are omnivorous, but mostly prefer vegetation. The Achatina species is a recognized pest, an invasive species that is banned from being importing and kept in the United States because it has begun to cause serious damage to crops, the collector said. According to him, they can only be kept in Bulgaria as pets, but as a rule, living small and large snails and eggs are not to be discarded.

“Snails do not like to be moved and I rarely travel with them,” said Trayanov. After Plovdiv, they will be displayed in the Ecomuseum & Aquarium in Ruse (on the Danube), where they can be seen from May 13.