Battle to save the tiny, gooey snail only found in one lake in the UK

Image source, Dudley Zoo Image caption, The glutinous snail was once widespread in the UK, but is now only found in one Welsh lake

A tiny snail found in only one lake in the UK has been dubbed as precious as an Egyptian artefact as conservationists bid to save it.

Several British zoos are setting up so-called ark populations of the glutinous snail, one of Europe's rarest species, using creatures bred in a back garden in Ceredigion.

"Beguiled by their cuteness," conservationist Ian Hughes has made it his "life-defining" mission to protect the threatened mollusc, which was once widespread in UK waters.

"There was a point where we'd got more snails in our garden than have ever been seen in the wild," he said.

Image caption, Ian has about 2,000 of the snails in homemade tanks in his garden