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The tale of Jeremy the “lefty” snail started in a compost heap in London in 2016, where Jeremy was discovered by a former scientist from London’s Natural History Museum who recognized his left-coiled shell as a “one in a million” genetic mutation. Most Cornu aspersum (garden snails) have a shell that coils to the right of their body. Jeremy's coiled to the left. Being so rare meant his search for love was that much harder – sex with another snail would be rather difficult, what with Jeremy's genitals sitting on the wrong side. The emotional roller coaster of the quest came to resemble a weepy movie with many a plot twist, but has also provided scientific insight into the cause of Jeremy's condition and on similar reversed body structures in other animals, including ourselves.
Following his discovery, Jeremy's plight captured the hearts of many when the University of Nottingham, UK, put out a public appeal to help find another lefty for him to mate with. The publicity received was so great Jeremy was dubbed a “shellebrity”, with his own Wikipedia page, but the project was not mere whimsy. Dr Angus Davison of the University of Nottingham anticipated the genetic mutation he thought caused Jeremy's condition would appear in his offspring.
Happily, two potential love interests were found in June 2017. But disaster struck when instead of vying for the attentions of our hero, the two snails – Lefty and Tomeau – chose to mate with each other instead. (Fun fact: snails are hermaphrodites, so have both sets of reproductive organs). Lefty successfully had children, and poor jilted Jeremy, in a heroic show of being the bigger snail, was spotted by his minders acting as “uncle” to the wee gastropods.
Undeterred by being once again left on the sidelines, Jeremy finally became the lead star as Tomeu produced a batch of 56 babies – about one-third of which were believed to have been "fathered" by Jeremy. Interestingly, just like their half-siblings before them, Jeremy’s offspring all hatched with right coiling shells, demonstrating that sometimes two wrongs do make a right.
The science behind this star-crossed lover revealed insights into the genetic origins of coil direction, with one theory suggesting lefties could arise from specific combinations of dominant and recessive versions of the genes that determine shell-coiling direction. This meant that Jeremy's righty babies were more likely to themselves produce left-coiling babies in the next generation, or even the generation after that.
The public appeal to find lefty love for Jeremy made it possible to match him with fellow mutant snails
Like all great love stories, Jeremy's last shot at love proved to be a bittersweet celebration when he died shortly after. In a press release emailed to IFLScience, Dr Davison said: “Although it is unfortunate that Jeremy has gone, the help that we have received from the public has been amazing. Because of the rarity of lefty garden snails, we have never before been able to get two lefty snails together to study the inheritance of the condition... None of this would have been possible without the public's help."
“We helped solve one of nature’s puzzles, which was very satisfying," Davison said in a statement. "There was also a happy ending for Jeremy, the snail, in finding love and producing offspring, albeit just before dying."
