This is Samira the Snail. As you can see, Samira is looking for a new house. Being the snail that she is, Samira likes to crawl through her home village, enjoying the humming and buzzing of insects, admire the size of larger animals, relax in the shade of

This is Samira the Snail. As you can see, Samira is looking for a new house. Being the snail that she is, Samira likes to crawl through her home village, enjoying the humming and buzzing of insects, admire the size of larger animals, relax in the shade of trees, and to drink clean water. Samira loves her fellow animals so much that she wants to build a house so considerate that even her great-grandchildren can enjoy the same marvelous nature. Can you help her with making the right decisions?

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The first question Samira asks herself is how big of a house she wants. Would a small one-room cottage be enough for her? It would certainly be less luxurious, but building a small house also means less work for her. Or should Samira build a two-story villa with multiple rooms? While this would mean more work, she could finally enjoy all the amenities she always sees on animalTV.

One-room cottage

Villa

Samira feels good about her choice. And so do her village neighbors. Building small means that she infringes less on the habitat of her fellow animals and plants. Samira's small cottage requires only little amounts of material and energy input. Keeping her impact small is key in her intention to preserve the nature that she so deeply cherishes.

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Samira's fellow animals start to complain because her villa is taking up so much space! Some neighbors are even forced to move away because their habitat was destroyed. More space for Samira means less space for everyone else. This puts stress on the whole village community. Building a villa also means that Samira requires more material and more energy to build her house. Her choice is thus turns out to be a burden on nature, instead of preserving it for her grand-children.

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Samira heard that one can build houses from different materials. Should she build her house from concrete? She could simply buy it in the hardware store of Herbert the Heron. Building with concrete is fast and efficient. Or should Samira build her house from wood and clay? This would take her considerably longer and her house could not be as big. Further, she would first have to check if she can find enough scrap wood, since she would not want one of her beloved tree friends to be cut down on her behalf.

Concrete

Wood and Clay

Samira runs into a wild crowd of microorganisms who are insistently protesting her choice! Concrete is not compostable, so they fear future starvation if too many objects in the landscape are made from concrete. The Shrub Club of the village joins in on the protest as well. Making concrete requires the raw material to be heated to ~1500°C. Burning this much coal and gas causes a C0² imbalance in the atmosphere, which in turn cause climatic changes that scare the Shrub Club.

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Samira meets Willy the Worm. In the name of all ground dwellers he wholeheartedly thanks Samira for her choice to build her house from compostable materials. Once the house is no longer needed, it will simply decompose and become food for Willy and his friends. No animal or plant is harmed in the process but even benefits! With this choice, Samira ensures that the local ecology stays healthy for generations to come!

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To stay dry on rainy days, Samira needs a roof on her house. She is unsure whether to make it from tar felt and pebble stone or if she should build a vegetated roof. Tar felt and pebble stone need no maintenance and are easy to install. A green roof on the other hand could create a hangout spot for Samira's plant and insect friends.

Tar Felt and Pebble Stone

Vegetated Roof

The village elderly Olli the Oak orders Samira to his place. In the name of the village, he expresses his discontent. The tar felt dissolves over time and contaminates the ground water. The hundreds of years, Olli the Oak had been living a content life. Now, his roots are starting to be clogged up by the tar in his drinking water. Samira's roof further heats up the surrounding area, since stones and black tar felt capture and store a lot of heat from the sun. This makes Samira much less popular than she used to be.

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The pollinator community is throwing a frisky party for Samira. They are so happy that the house is not for Samira alone, but that they too can live on it. Samira is now best friends with Ben the Bee, who regularly brings over his beetle and bug friends. The entire village enjoys Samira's choice, since happy pollinators mean that the future food supply is secured.

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Naturally, Samira needs a toilet in her house too. First, a conventional porcelain toilet comes to her mind. But then she recently heard about the possibility of building a compost toilet.

Conventional Toilet

Compost Toilet

Samira's village is suffering from a drought! The water level of the local lake has been declining for quite some time now. Meanwhile, Samira flushes down valuable fresh water down her toilet every day. Resentment of her thirsty friends towards Samira grows. Worse yet, the water management officials of the village deal out a heavy fine to Samira for being so wasteful.

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Samira feels how her health improves. The rich and fertile compost of her toilet grows the juiciest lettuce a snail could ever ask for! Further, the annual village water report shows that more water than ever has been saved, since, inspired by the juicy lettuce, the other villagers started to copy Samira's example. Compost toilets require no water at all, which means that the saved water can be used to grow even more food, instead of being flushed down the drain.

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Now that her house is all sorted out, Samira starts dreaming about her front yard. She keeps jumping back and forth between building one of those modern stone gardens or letting her yard grow into a wildflower garden.

Modern Stone Garden

Wildflower Garden

Samira observes how her friend Holly the Hedgehog is packing up her belongings, ready to move away. "What other options do I have?", Holly asks in despair. "In the stone garden there is no food, no shelter, and the stones get uncomfortably warm from the sun." The flower and wider plant community is giving inauspicious looks to Samira too. Sealing the ground with stones means that they too have no room in Samira's new garden.

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Samira notices how Lulu the Ladybug seems extraordinarily happy these days. "So much food, amazing spots to hang out, and all my friends live in the same place as me now," Lulu shouts full of joy. Samira's wildflower garden is the new popular hangout spot in the village. It is full of life and offers plenty of room for creative expression and free development for all plants and animals in it.

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Many years after Samira has finished her house, she thinks back about the various decisions she had to make. Her most striking memory is how every aspect of the building process had an immediate effect on her fellow animals and plants. From the start, Samira knew that she wanted to be ecologically considerate, but never did she realize how closely connected she was to the living world around her.

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As you probably guessed, the moral of this story is not that snails like to make friends with bees, hedgehogs and oak trees. Neither is the moral of the story that pooping into conventional toilets should be punished or that plants are generally superior to stones. The moral of the story is Interconnectivity. No matter if you are a snail, a tree, an insect, or a human; every action you take inevitably has an effect on the life of other living beings on this planet!

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