2.2 Mechanical extraction of snail slime.
The snail Helix Aspersa Muller is the terrestrial gastropod
mollusk that in the adult phase has a shell of a 3.5 cm diameter for a
weight of about 15 g. Among mechanical methods that do not damage the
animal, the use of a natural gas as ozone was selected to induce the
production of snail slime. The mechanical extraction involved the use of
an equipment that within a few hours allow to obtain the slime. More
specifically, the snails were inserted into a machine in which ozone was
nebulized for about an hour; the O3 generates a sort of
excitement that induces the slime production avoiding the stress of the
snail.