Where Snails Become Flowers

The lowly snail reaches an apotheosis—rivalling flowers and butterflies as an expression of nature’s artistry—in Cuban forests. Delicate sunrise tints of pink, blue, violet, green and yellow make the shells of two or three genera of tree-dwelling mollusks like rare jewels. Most conspicuous are snails of the genus Polymita, confined to the Oriente province. Here they cover some trees so completely that the effect is like that of a tree of flowers. Only upon close observation can one detect that the blossoms are shells.

The animals live for the most part on a fungus that grows on the bark. The colors of the shells are affected by various chemical constituents of the bark, notably tannic acid, and serve as warning to other creatures. In taste the snails are very bitter and no bird will intentionally attack them. The color serves notice that only a disgusting mouthful is to be had.

Two of the most beautiful of these shell forms were recently discovered by Dr. Paul Bartsch, former Smithsonian curator of mollusks. Fragile, translucent, colored as delicately as the loveliest of orchids, these particular snails are the fairies of the mollusk world in the unconscious artistry with which they have constructed their moving palaces. One, a hitherto unknown species, has a remarkable combination of pale orange, orange buff, deeper orange and flame color—all shading delicately into each other. The color effect is such as one might find rarely in rose petals. Another has a blending of ivory, olive green, lemon yellow and orange.