snailicide

English

Etymology

From snail +‎ -icide.

Pronunciation

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Noun

snailicide (countable and uncountable, plural snailicides)

1. A substance that kills snails.
   • 1951, Anais da Faculdade de Farmácia e Odontologia da Universidade de São Paulo, page 50:

     Organic snailicides for Katayama nosophora. J. Pharm. Soc. Japan. 69, 396-8, 1949. Citado segundo Chem. Abstr. 44, 3196, 1950.

   • 1951, Annual Report of the Commissioner of Health, Puerto Rico. Dept. of Health, page 134:

     The object of the project was to determine the possibility of using Sodium Pentachlrophenate as a snailicide and to see to what extent its use was practical, economical and efficient for the control of snails in our water courses;

   • 1957 March 24, “What Those Names On Spray Guns Mean”, in The Miami Herald, 47th year, number 112, page 10-B, column 3:

     A snailicide is for killing snails and slugs. Metaldehyde is a snailicide.

   • 1957, American Orchid Society Bulletin, page 782:

     If infestation occurs within the pots, it will take constant surveillance to eliminate this condition — picking off snails from plants and placing pellets near (but not on) new roots, so they will eat the poison. Liquid snailicides will also give satisfactory results.

   • 1958, Charles James Frankel, Lawyers’ Medical Cyclopedia of Personal Injuries and Allied Specialties, page 578:

     OPERATIONS AND PRODUCTS. / Suspected: Production of urea from ammonium carbamate, production of carbamates and polyurethan plastics, fungicides, weed killers, insecticides, insecticide repellents, snailicides, […]

   • 1959 April 12, “What To Do This Week”, in The Lima Citizen, second year, number 285, Lima, Ohio, page D-8, column 2:

     Scatter slug bait or dust with snailicide in shady places and around seed beds and cold frames before the slugs chew up seedlings as well as leaves of many plants.

   • 1959, Plants & Gardens, page 54:

     Slugs—metaldehyde in prepared baits or in snailicide

   • 1964, Agricultural Research Review, pages 87 and 95:

     Methoxychlor and DDT are comparatively poor snailicide materials. […] Now metaldehyde is accepted as the best snailicide and is giving good results in many countries.

   • 1970, Rice Research & Training in the 70’s, International Rice Research Institute, page 43:

     If, however, a heavy rain occurs just after seeding, snails destroy the seedlings unless the snails are eliminated by the application of a chemical snailicide.

   • 1975, Cactus and Succulent Journal, page 251:

     There are good commercial snailicides for the mollusks (snails and slugs), generally in the form of pellets, but one should also avoid the conditions in which they breed, such as rotting piles of leaves and trash and weeds.

   • 1981, The Aquarist and Pondkeeper, page 55, column 1:

     They were taking toll of the plants and looking most unsightly against the glass, so some measure (apart from squashing them) had to be devised. Not surprisingly, I did not reach out for a snailicide mixture.

   • 1984, The Orchid Review:

     […] a mental note was made concerning the desirable qualities of insecticides and snailicides.

   • 2003, Aquarium Fish Magazine, page 3:

     The last choice is to use poison. It’s a dangerous choice, however. Snailicides use copper sulfate as an active ingredient, which may harm plants or fish if improperly dosed.

   • 2010 October 31, Mark Freeman, “Wildlife crews race to kill invasive snails”, in Albany Democrat-Herald, 13th year, number 9, page D4, column 4:

     Copper sulfate is an approved snailicide by the federal Environmental Protection Agency.

2. (rare) The killing of a snail.
   • 1979, Sunset, page 154:

     commit snailicide […] SNAIL, SLUG & INSECT KILLER

   • 2001 September 19, Katie Watts, “All bark, no bite”, in Petaluma Argus-Courier, volume 147, number 6, page 15, column 4:

     Boy One and his friends delighted in our method of snailicide: partly because we paid well (five cents per snail) but also because they got to stay up late to get the job done.

   • 2009, Oonah V Joslin, “Trap”, in People of Few Words: Fifty Writers from the Writers’ Showcase of the Short Humour Site, Lulu.com, →ISBN:

     Away she went and fetched a photograph - a wagon train of snails crossing the lawn towards a buried beer glass and disappearing over the edge to their doom. It’s one thing to set a trap but to photograph actual snailicide... I was quite shocked.

   • 2020, Michele Gorman, The Staycation, Trapeze, →ISBN:

     She had half a mind to ring the RSPCA. Except then she’d have to confess to snailicide.