Abstract
The giant African snail (Achatina fulica), a globally invasive mollusk, poses a serious threat to agricultural production and the ecological environment. However, few studies have focused on the feeding preference and growth performance of A. fulica on different plants, with especially few reports on the correlation between the nutrient content of plants and its growth performance. In this study, 10 plant species, including lettuce, stem lettuce, spinach, Chinese cabbage, cabbage, rape, apple, pear, banana, and pitaya, were selected as food sources to explore their effects on the feeding and growth performance of A. fulica. The results showed that A. fulica had the highest selection rate for lettuce and the lowest for rape. Feeding consumption (FC), daily body growth (DBG), daily increase in shell diameter (DISD), daily increase in shell length (DISL), relative consumption rate (RCR), and relative growth rate (RGR) of snails feeding on lettuce were significantly higher than those in the other nine groups. FC, DBG, DISD, DISL, RCR, and RGR were significantly correlated with the nutrient contents (protein, carbohydrate) of the 10 plants and with the protein-to-carbohydrate (P:C) ratio. Finally, based on the correlation between the macronutrient content of plants and the growth performance of A. fulica, we determined that these snails exhibit the optimal growth performance when fed food with the relative balanced P:C ratios (0.41-0.66) while having poor growth performance when fed plants with extremely imbalanced P:C ratios (rape: 2.45 or fruits: 0.04-0.13). Our study shows that A. fulica may cause potential economic losses for many cultivated plants, particularly lettuce, and provides a foundation for certain research values for agricultural prevention and ecological environment protection.