Snails in Portugal – scientists release a rare species into the wild – UNIAN
Now environmentalists are releasing them into the wild.
A species of tiny snail has been brought back from the brink of extinction in Portugal. Desertas Island land snails were previously thought to have disappeared completely within 100 years, but experts were able to breed them in captivity after they found tiny populations on Desertas Grande Island in the Madeira archipelago, Portugal, Sky News writes.
More than 1,300 critically endangered snails are now being released into the wild on neighboring Bugio Island.
It is known that rescue efforts began when ecologists discovered two species of snails that were surviving on the rocky cliffs of the Desertas Grande desert. Fewer than 200 individuals were found in each population.
“They were believed to be the last of their kind, so…
