Partula snails: 500 leave the Detroit Zoo for Tahiti

ROYAL OAK. The Detroit Zoo is shipping 500 Partula snails more than 5,000 miles to Tahiti this week, the next release in a conservation effort that started in 1989. The snails were wiped out in the wild after a predatory species was introduced to French Polynesia decades ago.

The zoo and its partners have now restored 11 Partula species and released more than 17,000 snails total. Each one carries a dot of UV paint so researchers in Tahiti can track it after release. "It's hard not to get a little attached when you've watched these tiny snails grow here at the Zoo," said curator of amphibians Mark Vassallo.