Giant African Land Snail My Pet and Me

-I'm Ferne.

-I'm Rory. We love animals.

Some animals make brilliant pets and pets are great.

We really like meeting you and your pets.

I'm off to meet some new friends today,

but I'll be back to tell you about it.

-Would you like to come with me? See you!

-See you!

-Come on!

# My pet, my pet and me

# My pet, my pet and me

# Down every street are pets to meet

# Some big, some small, some scaly, some furry

# Some keep very still, some are always in a hurry

# Some have four paws

# Some have sharp claws

# Some quack, some bark

# Some purr, some moo

# Some grunt, some squawk

# Some cock-a-doodle-doo!

# My pet, my pet and me

# My pet, my pet and me

# My pet, my pet and me

# Have you met my pet and me? #

Today we are in North London to meet lots of new friends at this

nursery and I hear they have a very special pet.

Let's go meet them.

Wow!

-Hello, everybody!

-Hello, Ferne!

Hello! What are all your names?

-Jarimar.

-Momo.

-Elysia.

-Adam.

-Hannah.

-Hello!

-Hi, Ferne. I'm Charissa.

Hi! Thank you very much for inviting me here.

Who's this?

-Turbo.

-Turbo? And what is Turbo?

An African land snail.

That's right.

Giant African land snails originally come from Africa

and they can get up to 20 centimetres long.

-That's huge, isn't it?

-Yeah.

-Shall we take him out and have a closer look?

-Yeah.

We just wet our hands so we don't hurt him.

You can tell me all about Turbo.

So, Adam, what are these?

-Eyes.

-Yes, they're his eyes and they're on stalks

so he can move them around and have a good look around everywhere.

And what about these in the front, what are these?

Tentacles.

Tentacles? And can anybody tell me what he needs them for?

-To feel.

-To feel, that's right!

-His tentacles touch everything in his tank, don't they?

-Yeah.

Can anyone tell me what this on the back is?

His house.

His house, and it's his shell as well, isn't it?

-And is his house important?

-Yes.

Why is it important?

Because if an animal's coming to eat him, he has to hide in his house.

Yes, that's right, and did you know that as a snail grows,

the shell grows too?

I wonder if he has a couch there.

I wouldn't say so. I don't think he's got enough space for that!

I really, really like Turbo.

Rory, can you tell us some more facts about our shelly friends?

Of course, Ferne!

The bottom of a snail's body is called a foot.

The foot has lots of muscles in it to help it move.

Snails can curl their bodies up into their shell

and hide or have a rest.

Very clever!

Some snails live underwater.

Snails need lots of looking after, just like any other pet.

In fact, because they're in a tank, they are entirely dependent on their

owners, so we have to take extra special care of Turbo, don't we?

-Yeah.

-What do we do?

-We clean out his tank.

-Well, I think we should take Turbo out first, shouldn't we?

-Yes!

We'll keep him in there while his new house gets cleaned.

-And we'll put the lid on as well, won't we?

-Yes.

Because he's really good at climbing.

Right, I'll take this out.

-And we start digging.

-Start scooping, good job.

Nice big scoops, well done. You're both doing a very good job.

-It's getting empty.

-Should we clean it with a little bit of water?

Get all of this stuff.

Make sure there's no old soil left.

Can any of you girls tell me what this is on the side?

-A heating mat.

-And why do we need a heating mat?

-Because he wants to keep nice and warm.

-Exactly.

Do you know what happens when a snail gets very cold?

-He sleeps.

-That's right.

He hibernates, which is a very, very long sleep.

SHE SNORES

-We wouldn't want that to happen to Turbo, would we?

-No.

No, so what should we do? Cos now his tank is empty

and he's not going to have anything.

-Put soil.

-While you do that, shall I clean out his bowl?

-Yes.

It's very important that you get lots of nice,

clean soil without any stones or chemicals in it.

Great job!

-So what do we do now?

-We have to make the soil nice and wet.

-Yes, we do. Should we spray it?

-Yes.

So Turbo doesn't dry out.

It's very important not to make the soil too wet or else it would

just end up being a big, messy mud bath.

-Should we put his water bowl in?

-Yeah.

With the pebbles so he can get out.

Brilliant. And now what are we missing?

We have to put food out.

Good idea. We've got lots of nice, yummy snail food here, don't we?

We've got some spinach and banana, apple and cucumbers.

That's perfect, but we need something that is very,

very important for snails.

-Cuttlefish bone.

-Yes!

And do you know why he needs cuttlefish bone?

To make his shell really strong.

That is exactly why.

-Should we show Turbo his nice, new tank?

-Yes.

-OK.

We have a surprise for you!

What do you think?

-Do you think he's happy?

-Yeah.

Make sure the lid is on.

Let's go wash our hands.

Yucky and ducky!

You might think that snails don't really need to be played with

but actually, they can get quite bored

if you don't keep things interesting.

So what do we need to do before we pick up Turbo?

Wet our hands.

That's very good, so it's more comfortable for him.

Lovely. Wow.

We have to be very gentle, don't we?

Hello, little Turbo.

-He's very different from garden snails, isn't he?

-Yeah.

Cos they're very small.

-Shall we see if we can find some garden snails?

-I can find some.

OK, let's go! We'll put Turbo back.

See you in a minute, Turbo!

One behind.

No snails here.

No.

No snails here.

No snails here.

I found one, I found one!

-Yeah! Shall we bring it to Turbo?

-Yes!

What are we going to do?

-A snail race!

-Brilliant!

Right, come on, Turbo. Turbo against the garden snail.

What are we going to call this snail?

-Amelia!

-That sounds good.

Turbo against Amelia.

-On your marks...

-Get set... Go!

Come on, Turbo! He's just looking!

Amelia's kind of going.

-Shall we put some lettuce at the end?

-Yes!

Go, Amelia, go! Go, Amelia, go!

Go, Turbo!

Come on, Turbo! Go, go, go!

He's going the wrong way!

-Can you see the slime that's being left there?

-Yeah.

Slime is really important for snails

because it protects their bodies when they move.

She's so fast, isn't she?

Come on, Turbo! Amelia's winning!

Go, Amelia, go!

Yay! Amelia's the winner!

Turbo, no!

I'm going to put you back. Right.

So what do we do with Amelia, the winning snail?

-Put her back.

-Let's go!

Do you like having Turbo as a pet?

-Yes.

-Why?

-Because he's so adventurous.

-He is, isn't he?

If Turbo could go on any adventure in the entire world,

what adventure do you think he'd go on?

Hmm...

If my pet could go on any adventure,

he would go on a safari in the desert

and take his binoculars so he could spot all the animals.

He would see lots of wild animals, like jaguars, lions and elephants.

-I think Turbo has been really good today, do you?

-Yeah.

-Yeah.

-Should we give him a treat?

-Yes.

Well, I have a very special surprise for Turbo.

-Eurgh!

-Eww!

It is yummy!

Can anyone tell me what it is?

-Soup!

-Yes, but it's special snail soup.

Ahh!

It's OK, there's no snails in it, there's just

cucumber, spinach and lettuce.

With this soup, we're going to paint Turbo's tank

and then we can see him eat it.

So if we all dip our paintbrushes in...

-Yuck!

-Have a good dip.

Nice green, yummy, soupy paintbrushes

and we paint them on the side.

If you paint there... Perfect.

-Brilliant! I think that's enough. Shall we put our brushes back?

-Yeah.

Thank you.

Did you know that Turbo doesn't really have teeth or a tongue?

He has something really special

-so it's kind of like a tongue with teeth all over it.

-Wow!

Really strange, isn't it? And it is called a radula.

Look, there it is!

-I saw it, I saw it!

-I see his mouth!

I can see his tongue.

I've never seen his mouth before.

He's licking the soup because he likes it.

Look, his teeth!

Radula.

-Radula.

-Yeah.

What does it look like?

White.

And his teeth are very nice and interesting.

Scraping up all the yummy snail soup. Do you think he likes it?

-Yeah!

-I hope so.

-So are you going to make snail soup again?

-Yeah!

-Will it be really yummy?

-Yeah!

-Are you going to eat it?

-No!

No. It's just for Turbo. His special soup.

I've had so much fun meeting Turbo.

Thank you very much for introducing me to him.

-Hi, Rory.

-Hello. How are you doing? How was your day?

Oh, it was so much fun. Let me tell you all about it.

Today, I went to a nursery to meet some children

and their class pet, Turbo, a giant African land snail.

We cleaned out his tank and gave him fresh food.

Then we had a snail race between Turbo and a garden snail.

And we saw Turbo's unusual mouth, which is called a radula,

eating some snail soup off the glass.

Wow, that sounds amazing! And you made some great new friends, too!

I did, but it's really important to remember

that before you pet any animals, ask the owner's permission.

One pet you definitely can play with is ours.

Go to the CBeebies website and play the My Pet And Me game.

It is so much fun and we just love meeting you and your pets.

I've had such a wonderful day.

# Today we met a lovely pet

# We see how much you care for them

# Thank you so much for sharing them

# Time for us to just remind you

# After you've played with your pet

# Wash your hands, don't forget

# It doesn't matter what pet you've got

# You might have one, you might not

# It's still fun finding out what having a pet is all about

# My pet, my pet and me

# My pet, my pet and me

# My pet, my pet and me

# Come back and see my pet and me. #

Bye!