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Animals
Are snails cute?
The word snail is a common name that is used for almost all members of the molluscan class Gastropoda which have coiled shells in the adult stage. (Those snails which do not have a shell or only a very small shell are usually called slugs.)
Snails can be found in a wide range of different environments from ditches to deserts to the abyssal depths of the sea. The great majority of snail species are marine. Many others are terrestrial, and numerous kinds can be found in fresh water, and even brackish water. Many snails are herbivorous, though a few land species and many marine species are omnivores or predatory carnivores.
Although the average person might perhaps be more familiar with terrestrial snails, land snails are in the minority. Marine snails have much greater diversity, and a greater biomass. Snails which respire using a lung belong to the group Pulmonata, while those with gills form a paraphyletic group, in other words, snails with gills are divided into a number of taxonomic groups that are not very closely related.
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