The State - News from June 8, 1986

An unsolicited snail mailed from Hawaii to the president of the Snail Club of America in Fresno turned out to be a giant, African “type A” variety of the gastropod that is banned from the mainland because of its voracious appetite. Club president Ralph Tucker said the half-grown, 4-inch snail had partially consumed a letter sent with it, but enough of the address remained so he could tell that it had been mailed to him by a man in Kailua, Hawaii. “This is what we don’t want,” said biologist Theodore W. Fisher at the University of California, Riverside. “Watch out for the critters. Don’t keep them as pets.”