Golden Apple Snails

• Missing seedlings
• Floating of cut leaves
• Cut stems
• Decreased plant stand
• Sparse or uneven stand

• The golden apple snails rasp plant tissue and cut of stems with their file-like radula or horny tongue.
• The golden apple snail is considered a major problem in direct-seeded rice.
• During dry periods or drought, the golden apple snails remain inactive in rice fields.

• The golden apple snail has a muddy brown shell. The shell is lighter than the darker and smaller native snails. Its succulent flesh is creamy white to golden pinkish or orange-yellow. The male has a convex operculum that curves out or away from the shell, whereas the female lid curves into the shell.
• Neonates or the newly hatched snails have soft shell. The juveniles or young snails are <1.5 to 1.6 cm. Medium-sized snails have a shell height of 2 to 3 cm.
• The eggs are bright pink or strawberry pink. With age, they lighten in color or turn light pink when about to hatch.

Factors favouring pest development
• wetland and dryland habitats
• irrigation canals and rivers
• presence of alternate hosts
• presence of young seedlings
  
• continuous flooding of the rice fields
• presence of both gills and lung-breathing organs
• ability to survive in any environmental condition

• Increase mortality by mechanical action.
• Install screens with 5 mm mesh at water inlets. This can minimize the entry of snails into the rice fields and will also facilitate hand-collection.
• Handpicking and crushing, staking with bamboo or other wooden stakes before and after transplanting can be practiced to facilitate egg mass collection.
• Use of a hand-operated device to smash egg clusters between two snail egg clappers can also reduce the snail population.

• Planting older seedlings, planting at higher densities, or planting on ridges above the water line are advised against the golden apple snail.
• The field can be leveled-off or hydrotiller or rototiller to prepare the land.
• An off-season tillage to crush snails can also be employed.
• Snails can also be exposed to sun.
• Draining the field is also advised.
• Crop rotation with a dryland crop and fallow periods is also recommended as control.
• For easier drainage and collection of the golden apple snail, canalets can be constructed along bunds and inside paddyfield.
• Atractants like newspaper can be used.
• Good water management obtained by good levelling for the first two weeks is recommended.

Molluscicides such as metaldehyde is recommended.

• The use of common carp, Japanese crucian, heron, and weasels as biological control agents against the golden apple snail.
• A firefly nymph is also an effective natural enemy of the snail.
• Herding ducks and raising fish in the paddy are also recommended as biological control.
• Birds prey on both eggs and neonates. Rats and snakes also feed on them