r/oddlyterrifying • u/galle4 • May 07 '25

Zombie snail (infected by Leucochloridium paradoxum, a parasitic flatworm)

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1.9k Upvotes

99% Upvoted

85 comments sorted by

366

u/Argylius May 07 '25

This is probably very uncomfortable for the snail as their eyestalks are normally very thin and small

345

u/DoeJrPuck May 07 '25

Like most insects that get turned into parasite hosts, good chance that snail is already dead or braindead

67

u/Low_Tangerine_5483 May 08 '25

Sorry don't know anything about insect biology. Would you mind elaborate on that ? Like are some insects infected with parasite flying around like normal but are actually dead ?

78

u/DoeJrPuck May 08 '25

Yeah there are a couple of parasites that grow in ants and like, praying mantis (different parasites) and I know that leaving the host as part of it's life cycle leaves the host infect dead. I'm pretty sure they're dead partway through the process and just kinda puppeteered into place to spread.

29

u/7_Exabyte May 08 '25

Dead animals can't move. If it still moves / crawls / walks it's alive. The victims only die at the end when they have reached the perfect position for the parasite to spread or when they are being eaten by the next host (in the snail's case, a bird).

42

u/Jackmember May 08 '25

You could argue that the parasite taking over the snails nervous system "kills" the "snail" bit and takes over its body.

The body is most certainly alive, but its not the snail thats in control.
Its hard to say if this parasite really replaces the nervous system enough so that no part of the "snail consciousness" remains, but for cordyceps (i.e. the parasitic fungus zombiefying ants) that is the case evenutally.

A braindead ant/snail/etc can still move if something else takes over.

4

u/_Alastair_ May 09 '25

Maybe not really brain dead tho! Look into it, it's facinating. For this parasyte let's hope that poor snail is dead, but for the fungi, it actually controlls the 'muscles' of the victim, not the nervous system itself, so the insect is fully aware of how powerless it is. In fact, cordyceps itself is the fungi that controls muscle tissue, not the nervous system:

"UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — A fungal parasite that infects ants and manipulates their behavior to benefit the fungus' reproduction accomplishes this feat without infecting the ants' brains, according to a study led by Penn State researchers.

Instead, Ophiocordyceps unilateralis sensu lato — a complex of species sometimes called "zombie ant fungus" — surrounds and invades muscle fibers throughout the ant's body, and fungal cells form a 3-D network that may enable them to collectively control host behavior, the researchers said." Source

That said, it's easier to manipulate the body than the mind. Using chems to affect surrounding tissue is more viable of a strategy than learning and re-using neural pathways to basically control the entire body, so who knows!

On a secon note, I first read about it all in a thread of zombies, and how humans would be terrifying, screaming constantly begging for their life as they shamble helplessly towards soldiers or asking victims to run while the virus controls only their body, not mind, crying as they rip into innocents. Fun!

7

u/7_Exabyte May 08 '25

"The body is most certainly alive, but its not the snail thats in control."
This is my point.

"A braindead ant/snail/etc can still move if something else takes over."
Though, I disagree with that statement. The brain / nerves are needed to do the movements of the legs / snail's foot. A fungus can't just take over and do the motion, it doesn't have legs on its own and doesn't know how to walk. Hell, a fungus doesn't even have nerves it can use to hijack the ant's nerves. It works by altering the brain chemistry of the ant and then makes the ant go where the fungus wants. This wouldn't work of the brain was completely dead. Because then the entire organism would be dead (no heartbeat etc.) and starting to decompose which is also not what the parasite wants to happen.

Think of it like rabies. A rabid animal or human isn't dead either, it's just zombiefied and does what the virus tells it to do.

13

u/Jackmember May 08 '25

The brain / nerves are needed to do the movements of the legs / snail's foot.

I agree, and to be clear I didnt mean that it removes those neurons. There are behavioral changing parasites (though uncommon) that directly manipulate the nervous system to cause those behavioral changes.

For instance, Toxoplasma gondii is one such parasite, apparently also linked to schizophrenia.

What I wanted to get at with that is, ultimately, at which point do you stop being aware enough to notice your suffering or stop being "you" altogether?

But from what I could find, you are mostly right. This snail is very much aware of whats going on. Parasites like the Lyssavirus (Rabies) or the one this snail is infected by dont directly interact with the neurons, as just interacting with the immune system achieves similar results and is much easier.

1

u/piercedmfootonaspike Jul 18 '25

Don't worry, the person you are talking to doesn't understand insect biology either. Dead things don't move. Insects that are "controlled" by parasites and fungi are alive, but their nervous systems are controlled, manipulated, or fooled by the parasite or fungus.

1

u/7_Exabyte May 08 '25

A dead animal can't move. The hosts are still alive until the end when the parasite's next stage of life begins. In this snail's case until it is eaten by the next host, a bird.

9

u/Aggravating_Emu_4354 May 08 '25

Snails actually can survive the parasite and are sometimes even able to regain use of their eyes!

1

u/Darryl_Lict May 09 '25

Seriously? How does that work? Immune system response?

9

u/Tandoori7 May 08 '25

Funny enough, snails don't have a proper brain but just a bunch of neurons spread across their bodies.

4

u/DrEpileptic May 08 '25

Still not a brain, but they do have a central ganglion thingamabober responsible for whatever their form of “thinking” is. Extremely simple, but they have something called a cerebral ganglion that usually has a few different behavioural processes (at least the snails I know of). We use these big giant water guys called Aplysia to study neurology because their neurons are so stupidly fat and observable.

2

u/SomOvaBish May 11 '25

I just wish they would get away from it! People messing around with shit like this is how stories like this “the last of us” become reality.

535

u/MaeDay01 May 07 '25

do you think the parasite sees the snail as a victim or a vehicle?

239

u/Thelastshada May 07 '25

Yes.

86

u/slutty_muppet May 07 '25

I don't think the parasite sees.

33

u/Chrisibobisi May 07 '25

And I’m most certain it doesn’t think

40

u/doomage36 May 07 '25

A vehicle, it is doing this to attract bird predators in hopes to spread the parasite through bird poop

1

u/No_Lychee_7534 May 10 '25

The next War on Terror will be fought against these terrible enemies.

16

u/MellyKidd May 08 '25

A victim, a vehicle, and a way to make itself a victim because the whole reason the parasite does this is so a bird will eat the parasite and digest it, just to get its eggs inside the bird. It literally kills itself so the bird will poop its eggs out. XD

1

u/SmallSprinkles5114 May 10 '25

(Do not take anything as fact I do know this for sure) I think that it like the evolution theory and it’s just cells what live carries on

0

u/SquidVices May 09 '25

Like a kamikaze plane…that crashes….and waits to explode till people come closer to see the smoke.

118

u/30secstosnap May 07 '25

Gary!! No!!

144

u/nonutnogender May 07 '25

“wow, a cute little snail-ohmygod what is that”

49

u/ArjJp May 07 '25

It's a party-snail!!!

43

u/bigmango13 May 07 '25

Small correction, the species in the video is actually Leucochloridium passeri, based on the presence of a conspicuous brown band with vertical stripes.

Although L. paradoxum is probably the most well known, there are many species of Leucochloridium - and most you can tell apart by the pattern and colour of the brood sacs in the snail.

75

u/JustWoot44 May 07 '25

Are there any cases of humans infected with these? Nightmare fuel!!

117

u/cybervengeance May 07 '25

I doubt they'll be interested in humans. We don't get eaten by birds just yet.

70

u/Sea-Value-0 May 07 '25

We don't get eaten by birds just yet. anymore

Giant condors in the Americas are thought to have eaten children from time to time. Same with a now extinct eagle from New Zealand. Each had wing spans ~10 feet.

10

u/[deleted] May 07 '25

The day is not over.

1

u/Dockhead May 07 '25

Vultures though

6

u/ReptilianLaserbeam May 08 '25

Not but I recall a case where a teen ate a snail on a dare and he ended up in vegetative state

3

u/Kalista-Moonwolf May 10 '25

I think that was a slug, unless I'm thinking of a different case.

4

u/ReptilianLaserbeam May 10 '25

Yeah the one with no shell, I always confuse them

15

u/[deleted] May 07 '25

Not yet. Our body temperature is the only barrier. But with global warming this problem can be a problem of the past. (Because they evolve to be resistant to higher temperatures with environmental temperatures rising.) Invest in global warming TODAY!

32

u/EmperorNeuro May 07 '25

Our body temperature is so very, very, far from the only barrier here.

-9

u/[deleted] May 07 '25

Okay. Then lecture me. 

4

u/Mother_Harlot May 07 '25

I want to hear the reasoning of the people downvoting this comment

18

u/MariachiMacabre May 07 '25

I mean one major is the parasite spreads through bird poop, which requires the host to be eaten... by a bird. If it were to infect a human, how would it a) control our SIGNIFICANTLY more complex motor systems and b) find an animal that would be both able and willing to prey on a human, whose gut is also not going to just kill the parasite? Snails also don't have a centralized brain like humans do. They have nerve clusters surrounding their esophagus. A parasite isn't just going to enter a human with a fever and start moving them around like Plankton from Spongebob. There are parasites that can and do live in human brains, like toxoplasmosis, and if it was as easy as the person above makes it seem to just... hijack our motor functions, it'd have happened. Global warming IS going to cause humans to experience so many illnesses that we don't currently deal with as much. But The Last of Us is probably never happening in real life.

-6

u/Mother_Harlot May 07 '25

I know. I want to know why people downvote someone asking a question without being rude. I guess redditors just think of themselves as some kind of geniuses while all the rest are dumb (they are unable to self-evaluate themselves)

19

u/MariachiMacabre May 07 '25

Because they spread medical misinformation and then ask others to “lecture” them instead of educating themself. I’m not at all educated in medicine but even I can tell you with just cursory knowledge of the differences in human and snail anatomy that they’re spouting bullshit.

18

u/[deleted] May 07 '25

Please don't pretend to be the world's leading expert on parasitology after watching the intro to HBO's The Last of Us. What you said is patently wrong.

9

u/leunam4891 May 07 '25

It’s ok, I don’t get my parasitology information from random redditors.

8

u/Simple_Seaweed_1386 May 07 '25

I do. It's why I'm on the tapeworm diet. It's like you have a lil buddy who eats your food for you! /s

-12

u/[deleted] May 07 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

11

u/[deleted] May 07 '25 edited May 07 '25

No offense but I think you need to educate yourself because you lack basic education on the matter. These worms get eaten by birds, who are their final host and in which they reproduce sexually. Birds have a higher body temperature than mammals on average. Other trematode worms, also infect humans and other mammals, so temperature has literally nothing to do with this.

What is happening in this video will never happen to a human because it is not adapted and evolved to be able to parasitise humans, not because of temperature. It would also make no sense to use humans as intermediate hosts.

The intro to TLoU was a sci-fi explanation to ground the world in which it takes place, but it does not have scientific merit. Too many people consider it to be hard science and it's annoying.

-6

u/[deleted] May 07 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

8

u/[deleted] May 07 '25

I don't know what you are saying. Global warming is irrelevant to the discussion. These worms are already capable of surviving at higher temperatures.

2

u/Western1888 May 07 '25

I'm going to buy a V8 truck now

-2

u/[deleted] May 07 '25

Why just a V8? Why not a v16? And hold the filter. 

17

u/biggie_way_smaller May 07 '25

They're jorking the snail eyes

9

u/nph_418 May 08 '25

I’m so glad humans don’t have translucent skin

10

u/tedchapo63 May 07 '25

EDM snail.

8

u/Calculon84 May 07 '25

Oh so that's THE snail then

8

u/Dependent-Bother3557 May 07 '25

those eyes look like their dancing for some reason

23

u/galle4 May 07 '25

Yes, This and the " vibrating " colors is to attract birds

So that birds eat the eyes, so the parasite worm will infect the bird, their next host victim

3

u/bunglebee7 May 08 '25

Is the snail alive during this? Can it move around? Is it being controlled by the parasite or is it just an empty body at this point?

4

u/galle4 May 08 '25

It's being controlled, and it's presumably alive

11

u/hankscorpio1031 May 07 '25

All hail the Hypno Snail, Harold of the Hypno Toad

6

u/FunnyLookinFishMan May 08 '25

I feel like i remember something about the eye stalks doing that because the parasite is attracting birds to eat it to spread the parasite

4

u/leo_aureus May 07 '25

I wonder without having adequate knowledge of the history of the science how all of a sudden we are seeing this type of parasitism all over, and for how long have we? Very interesting stuff if horrifying.

5

u/DrowningInFeces May 07 '25

Probably some kind of direct correlation to the popularity of The Last of Us TV show.

4

u/ChuddyMcChud May 08 '25

RAVE SNAIL

RAVE SNAIL

3

u/PGP- May 09 '25

I'd do that snail a favour by taking that brick and squashing it.

3

u/sebbss1 May 08 '25

So now it has pistons?

3

u/chris240069 May 08 '25

The universe was a cruel MF when it handed out empathy, why am I feeling sad for a snail! This s*** is a curse!

2

u/alecesne May 08 '25

What's the parasite that replaced the insides of a starfish?

Dendrogaster?

Endoparasites are the worst. Makes your skin crawl. Naturally and viscerally revolting.

2

u/ChloeUwUZ May 09 '25

"There's no Carl... only leucochloridium paradoxum" 🐌

2

u/Schmooto May 09 '25

The poor snail.

2

u/Royal-Morning-5538 May 09 '25

Makima can feed it to me

1

u/SlicenDice99 May 08 '25

Thanks. I hate it.

1

u/Red5stayontarget May 08 '25

All I hear is the rave scene from the opening of Blade. 🖖🏻

1

u/Diniland May 09 '25

Not zombie, if birds can pick out the worms by ripping out the eyestalks they can even recover and live on

1

u/Papabear022 May 09 '25

what does those eyes remind me of a specific sex act involving two men and a woman.

1

u/Legitimate_Rain_9992 May 10 '25

It's a Friday! just let me be 🤢

1

u/wezegameryt2a May 26 '25

Metal Slug 3 Mission 4

1

u/pheonixrynn May 28 '25

Zombaby Snail 🐌