In the Mimosa Park area of Luling along the canal on Primrose Drive there is something lurking under the water.
“I don’t like it. They are poisonous.” said Dorcas Frickey when WWL-TV’s Paul Dudley stopped to ask her about Apple Snails in the neighborhood.
Since 2006, the Apple Snails and their pink eggs have been spotted all across Louisiana, but Terri Lawson says she has never seen them in her neighborhood until now. She’s has, however, read all about them.
“They seem to be aggressive in the canals and waterways in freshwater,” said Lawson.
The snails carry Rat Lungworm Disease, but that’s only a problem if you under cook them if you eat them. The larger threat, according to Zack Lemann with Audubon Butterfly Garden & Insectarium, has to do with the snails eating so much of vegetation.
“That eliminates hiding places for fish and smaller animals,” said Lemann. It eliminates food for all the other things that live in the water. It becomes a aquatic desert if you have an Apple Snail explosion.”
The snails can also cause problems for rice farmers and can clog up crawfish traps. As for getting rid of them --- experts say if the snails are out of the water for long enough they will die. For the eggs, it’s the opposite. They can’t live in the water. Still, how did these snails, native to South America, end up in Louisiana?
“People probably had them in aquatic systems, released the snail (because it) was probably eating too much vegetation and thought ‘oh I am just going to throw this thing out…” said Lemann.
Now people just want them out of their neighborhoods.
"They are a nuisance," said Frickey.
Paul Dudley can be reached at pdudley@wwltv.com.