National Snail Day takes place every year in the United States. Snails are small shelled animals well-known for moving slowly; their speed depends on their particular species. On average, they move between 0.5 and 0.7 inches per second. Many places in the U.K. appreciate the creature where people organize snail races. They enjoy the irony and the fun of watching and waiting for the famously slow animals to reach the finish line. Snails create silvery mucus that leaves a trail behind them while they move. Land snails cannot hear and use their eyes and olfactory organs to navigate their environment. Their sense of smell helps them find food, making it their most important sensory tool.
Snails are gastropod mollusks distinguished by their most striking physical feature, a spiral shell. Situated on their backs, this hard structure composed of calcium carbonate protects their soft bodies and internal organs and keeps growing as they mature.
Snails are most active at night and usually come out very early in the morning. They avoid moving too much on the ground when the sun is out. Snails have interesting biological features. Though some species have sex differentiation, most are hermaphrodites, meaning that each snail has male and female reproductive organs, however, they mate like other animals with a partner. After mating, the snails lay eggs. The baby snails hatch from the eggs when they are most vulnerable. At this time they are basically defenseless against predators like birds, turtles, and beetles.
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