Meet the Mizoram Apple Snail: India’s newest species of freshwater snail

The snail, given the common name Mizoram Apple Snail, has a shell height and diameter of about 2.5 cm. When asked if these snails are edible, Dr. Aravind NA explained that most species in this genus are edible.

There are only two species of Pila from India which are restricted to streams and the other one Pila saxea is found in the northern Western Ghats. Other members of this group are restricted to stagnant water bodies such as paddy fields, ponds, marshes and lakes. (Photo: Aravind NA)

Written by: Aswathi Pacha

3 min readKochiJul 1, 2021 06:14 PM IST First published on: Jul 1, 2021 at 05:19 PM IST

In July 2017, Aravind N.A. and his team from the Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), Bangalore, set out to study the land snails in the Blue Mountain National Park of Mizoram. On their way back, they explored a small waterfall near the National Highway for freshwater snails and luckily stumbled upon a species new to science. Named Pila mizoramensis, it is the sixth member of the Pila genus from India and the second species to inhabit hill streams. Pila is commonly known as Apple Snails.

“It is currently found in only two localities in Mizoram. The ‘type locality’ or the place from where the first individual was collected is already facing threats due to garbage dumping and other human disturbances such as washing of vehicles near the falls,” explains Dr Aravind N.A., corresponding author of the paper recently published in Molluscan Research. He is an Associate Professor at the Suri Sehgal Center for Biodiversity and Conservation, ATREE.