SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
In the forests of New Zealand's North Island, park rangers have been working for more than a decade to save a threatened population of giant snails. Now, these are not your average garden snails. They're larger, up to 4 inches long. They've got dark, glistening bodies and shiny shells that coil into a golden point.
RUBY BENNETT: Shiny. Shiny and beautiful.
JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
That is Ruby Bennett, biodiversity ranger for New Zealand's Department of Conservation. She says these snails are also carnivorous. And they put on quite a show when they eat a worm.
BENNETT: If you go on YouTube and look at a video, they kind of slurp it up like spaghetti. And it's not as slow as you might think.
DETROW: In fact, the snails' eating habits are crucial to their role in regulating the New Zealand ecosystem. But the real problem is what's eating the snails. Invasive predators - like possums, rats and pigs - have learned to slurp up those snails.
SUMMERS: So New Zealand has been working to eradicate the non-native predators with toxic bait. Then rangers like Bennett conduct a regular snail census to see how it's working.
BENNETT: You line everyone up on your hands and knees. And then you just crawl through the undergrowth, moving all the leaf litter aside, looking for your snails.
SUMMERS: The department released an update this month. And they found that untreated areas where predators ran rampant saw a sharp decline in live snails, as you might expect. But snails in the treated areas are holding on and maintaining their numbers.
BENNETT: It was definitely a relief to know that they're still there and know that they're still doing OK.
DETROW: The project is just a microcosm of New Zealand's larger goal to eliminate most invasive predators by 2050. It is the largest project of its kind in the world. And it will also benefit other native species, like the nation's rare birds.
SUMMERS: And if you were wondering why we should care about snails of all things, Jann Vendetti, the associate curator of mollusks at the Natural History Museum of LA County says...
JANN VENDETTI: Studying snails, you sort of get used to people, like, not caring very much about them. But why should we care about any living thing? Like, why should we care if there's tigers? Why should we care if there's elephants?
SUMMERS: She admits that certain animals are more charismatic than snails but says every organism plays its part in the world.
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