"It's a snail eat snail world,'' Wolfgang Sterrer quipped as he pulled out a drawer filled with hundreds of fossil land snail shells.

Dr. Sterrer, head of the Bermuda Aquarium, Museum, and Zoo, was unveiling a little known fact about Bermuda's natural environment.

For while Bermudians understand the importance of fighting to save the Bermuda Cahow or the Skink, few know the tale of the endemic Bermuda Land Snail genus, Poecilozonite.

Hailed as a classic example of species diversification from a single animal, hundreds of fossils lay hidden within a temperature controlled room at the sprawling Smith's Parish facility.

It is also the tale of the destruction of the last living species of Poecilozonites (pronounced pe-sil-o-zon-eye-tees), thought to have been wiped out by man's intervention a generation ago.

Contrary to legend that French general and later president Charles DeGaulle brought them here, someone imported the Spanish Edible Snail, Otala Lactea, for a meal in the 1920's.

They escaped from a paper bag which led to a catastrophic mistake in the 1950's.

It was the introduction of the carnivorous species Euglandina rosea and Gonaxis quadrilateralis in 1958 and 1969 to ostensibly control the runaway escargot that may have led to the destruction of the native Bermuda snail.

Using the informed wisdom of the time, the Agriculture Department, after consultation with the Commonwealth Institute of Biological Control introduced the cannibal snails.

But by the 1970's Dr. Sterrer remembers opening his front door to find none other than Harvard paleontology professor Steven Jay Gould bent over in a bush outside the Bermuda Biological Station for Research exclaiming: "If I could only find just one alive!''.

Dr. Gould later found what he believed to have been fresh shells at an un-named site.

The Aquarium intends to look further afield to find the snails -- a promise reminiscent of the expedition to find the supposedly extinct Cahow in 1951.

Dr. Gould's "An Evolutionary Microcosm: Pleistocene and Recent History of the Land Snail Poecilozonites in Bermuda'' recalls a different time, one where islanders remembered collecting the snails by the bucketful to be ground up and burnt for lime and mortar.

Story of Bermuda's lost snail Bermudians would recognise the major players in the saga: Euglandina, readily identifiable with its lengthwise grooves in its elongated brown shell; and the little round white Gonaxis.

The pest Otala has a white shell with brown bands and curled lip opening and are now commonly seen throughout the Island.

Poecilozonites, whatever the size and species, are generally flying saucer shaped, white with bands.

It is thought that deep within the Island's murky past, hundreds of thousands or even millions of years ago, the prototypical snail colonised the Island from North America.

Scientists say there might have been only one because they believe the snail can self-impregnate.

Over the millennia, the snail's numbers and the numbers of species would jump as ice age seas dropped revealing a prehistoric Bermuda reaching all the way to North Rock.

Without predators until mankind arrived in the 1500s, the snail spread and multiplied to become 95 percent of land animal fossils on the reduced land mass that we know.

The Spanish brought hogs, while from 1609 the English brought dogs, cats, rats, and other animals that contributed to the decline.

But it may have been the arrival of Euglandina that pushed the defenceless snail at breakneck speed down the slimy slope to possible extinction.

"There's a good chance there's one species still alive,'' Dr. Sterrer said.

"I think that when Gould writes about the species being still alive, he is talking about a species called Poecilozonites bermudensis.

"We sent out a student this summer to have a look around, but that was unsuccessful. The Aquarium will be looking for them in the future.

"We're trying to revisit the sites that Gould visited in the '60s for two reasons. One, to recollect fossil shells to fill out our collection and two, to find them alive.'' Dr. Gould is confident that P. bermudensis is still alive, but he threw his weight behind a search for the snail.

"It may still exist,'' he said. "In the 60's it was still very common, especially in the area around the Bio Station.'' Speaking about the importance of the Poecilozonites, the former Bio Station intern said: "They are part of a class that are uniquely found on islands.

Islands have these strange fauna because of their isolation.

"Back when I was studying them, we did not know where they came from or their closest relative. That can be done now with genetic research.

"Poecilozonites had a very impressive radiation in Bermuda. By far one of the largest for a species. It is a wonderful example of an experiment in local evolution.'' Dr. Gould was also careful to explain that the Bermuda land snail's population could also have fallen victim to Gonaxis and environmental factors like loss of habitat and predation, in addition to the voracious Euglandina.

"It's just that people did not realise that with the Euglandina, it would eat other snails too. Not just Otala, which by then had become a pest,'' he said.

"No one ever said that Poecilozonites ever caused them trouble. It certainly is a tragic story.'' Dr. Sterrer, expanding on the theme of extinction of Island species, said: "Islands are among the most valuable places in the world with regard to biodiversity.

"Island species are less well defended against predator species, competitors, and parasites. I mean, why invest the resources if you do not have a natural predator? "For Bermuda, the Poecilizonites are just like the Bermuda Cedar, the Cahow, Skink and some plants. And they possibly have gone the way of so many Island species.'' Three species of snails -- P. bermudensis bermudensis, P. reinianus, and P.

circumfirmatus -- were still abundant into the 1960's.

Only time and effort will tell whether or not they fell victim to the killer snail with the help of his friend, mankind.