Snail Home

For the first few weeks, the snails lived in a big transparent utility box. It is really convenient since it is easy to keep the humidity up. But it doesn’t really look good and it’s not nice to observe them.

I had many ideas but one thing was for sure. I didn’t want a simple terrarium/aquarium. I wanted something special. An eyecatcher for our living room. Combine pretty with functional.

I ended up purchasing a pretty showcase at IKEA.

First I had to build a bottom that holds the substrate and can handle the constant humidity. I chose to make it out of acrylic glas. Just simply measured the bottom and cut the pieces I needed. I assembled the pieces with silicone thats made for builing fish tanks. That way I could be sure that it won’t harm the snails.

Giving that some time to dry over night, I started working on the background. I still had coconut mat left over from another project. the corners are fastened with plastic straps on the corners and some silikone to keep it from creasing too much.

Since I didn’t want the enclosure to be too high to avoid the snails falling from a big hight and damage their shells, I used some acrylic glass I had left to create one full level, that would be used for plants and one half one that was included in the snail enclosure itself.

The next day I added a little tree that is a branch of an apple tree. I fastened that in the middle with silicone.

After a few hours of drying, I could finally fill in the bottom substrate. I also added a lot of moss and roots that I collected in our garden. Those materials I watered for a few days to make sure that no unwanted guests move into the enclosure.

Then it was time for a test run to make sure that I match the parameters the snails need.

Sure that everything is working out, I put in the snails. They started right away exploring the new place. turned out that they LOVE to climb. All three were fascinated with the mini tree.

It is so much fun to watch them in there.

A few days later I found this little photo frame with a glass front. Perfect piece to add a little fun to this project. 🙂

To controll the heat, I fasted a heat mat on the backside of the enclosure and bought a daylight lamp that is hanging on top of the showcase, also ensuring that the plants get what they need to grow.

The holder for the lamp is just a simple stick we got from the garden.