Given the task definition and input, reply with output. In this task, you are given a text of many news articles seperated by special token "|||||". Your task is to summarize them.

The largest stretch 8 inches. The oldest live nine years. The busiest lay up to 1,200 eggs. 
  
 Everywhere they go, people stop to gape. The giant African land snail is a massive mollusk now infesting Miami-Dade County and threatening other parts of Florida. 
  
 They ooze in large bushes, gnaw through the stucco and plaster of residential homes and consume at least 500 different plants. The rare breeds of the species even carry a parasitic nematode that can lead to meningitis in humans — although no cases of disease transmission have been documented yet. 
  
 Since September 2011, more than 116,000 of the snails have been found in 20 areas speckled throughout the county. 
  
 They come from east Africa and have been spread throughout the world from the pet trade, both as a food resource and through accidental introduction. They're considered one of the most dangerous and damaging snails — and they're being openly targeted. 
  
 At the state and federal level, the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services is on a mission to eradicate the snails before they spread through Florida, said Denise Feiber, the public information director of the Division of Plant Industry in Gainesville. 
  
 “They're a trifecta,” said Feiber, who's traveled to Miami several times to help dispose of the snails. “They're a risk to property, health and agricultural resources and landscapes.” 
  
 Since the hunt began more than a year ago, scientists have scoured targeted neighborhoods, initiated an outreach program to alert residents and started a help line. 
  
 The last giant snail outbreak took place in the '60s, when a young boy returned with three from Hawaii and left them in his grandma's garden. They multiplied quickly, taking nine years to exterminate. 
  
 Feiber said she doesn't want this eradication project to last that long. 
  
 So, on Tuesday and Wednesday, about 15 scientists — 12 of whom were giant snail specialists who traveled from areas as far as California and Canada — gathered at the local plant industry building to review their present progress, address any shortcomings and discuss more efficient extermination methods. 
  
 “What we did is we brought in experts from all over the country,” said Trevor Smith, a scientist and bureau chief at the plant industry in town. “The idea was to look at our program in Miami and ask ourselves: How are we doing? I can't think of another meeting where we've had this many African snail specialists together. Some great ideas came out.” 
  
 One dealt with improving the bait used to kill the snails. In the past, scientists used an iron-phosphate granule, Smith said, but they were looking for something better, something stronger. 
  
 “We've seen there's better metaldehyde products out there that are extremely effective,” he said, “and one of the things we discussed at the seminar is how we were going to incorporate some of these new chemicals into the program.” 
  
 Currently, a group of about 50 scientists deal with the Miami infestation hands-on, Feiber said. They examine targeted areas, spread bait and cart the snails they find back to the lab for a freeze death and further testing. 
  
 Although the work is difficult and time-consuming, the bait mixture and removal methods are paying off, Feiber said. 
  
 “We're still collecting 400 to 500 (snails) a week,” Feiber said, “but the good news is, more and more are deceased when we find them.” 
  
 So far, the species hasn't advanced to other metropolitan areas like Tampa, Orlando and Fort Myers. 
  
 But Smith said he's concerned. Despite the present containment, he worries that other cities aren't aware of the gravity of the situation. 
  
 “I think it has the capability to travel up to North Florida,” he said. “You could ask anybody in South Florida and they know about it. It's in the papers. It's on TV. We have billboards, we have fliers. It's on the side of the buses. But in the rest of Florida … I'm not so sure.” 
  
 Future outreach programs in the next year will be focused on these areas, he said. 
  
 In the meantime, everyone keeps their eyes peeled. 
  
 Although the snails are behemoths, they blend in well with their surroundings, Feiber said, and they can be transferred by people. If someone moved a plant that a giant snail nestled into to a different part of the state, the infestation could spread rapidly because of the snail's speedy reproduction rate, she added. 
  
 “It's definitely something that we have to keep our eye on,” she said, cradling a deceased snail's shell in her office. “This snail is one of the most-feared invasive pests in the world.” ||||| A Giant African land snail is seen in this handout picture from the Florida Department of Agriculture Division of Plant Industry taken September 19, 2011. 
  
 A Giant African land snail is seen in this handout picture from the Florida Department of Agriculture Division of Plant Industry taken September 9, 2011. 
  
 ORLANDO, Florida South Florida is fighting a growing infestation of one of the world's most destructive invasive species: the giant African land snail, which can grow as big as a rat and gnaw through stucco and plaster. 
  
 More than 1,000 of the mollusks are being caught each week in Miami-Dade and 117,000 in total since the first snail was spotted by a homeowner in September 2011, said Denise Feiber, a spokeswoman for the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. 
  
 Residents will soon likely begin encountering them more often, crunching them underfoot as the snails emerge from underground hibernation at the start of the state's rainy season in just seven weeks, Feiber said. 
  
 The snails attack "over 500 known species of plants ... pretty much anything that's in their path and green," Feiber said. 
  
 In some Caribbean countries, such as Barbados, which are overrun with the creatures, the snails' shells blow out tires on the highway and turn into hurling projectiles from lawnmower blades, while their slime and excrement coat walls and pavement. 
  
 "It becomes a slick mess," Feiber said. 
  
 A typical snail can produce about 1,200 eggs a year and the creatures are a particular pest in homes because of their fondness for stucco, devoured for the calcium content they need for their shells. 
  
 The snails also carry a parasitic rat lungworm that can cause illness in humans, including a form of meningitis, Feiber said, although no such cases have yet been identified in the United States. 
  
 EXOTIC INVASION 
  
 The snails' saga is something of a sequel to the Florida horror show of exotic species invasions, including the well-known infestation of giant Burmese pythons, which became established in the Everglades in 2000. There is a long list of destructive non-native species that thrive in the state's moist, subtropical climate. 
  
 Experts gathered last week in Gainesville, Florida, for a Giant African Land Snail Science Symposium, to seek the best ways to eradicate the mollusks, including use of a stronger bait approved recently by the federal government. 
  
 Feiber said investigators were trying to trace the snail infestation source. One possibility being examined is a Miami Santeria group, a religion with West African and Caribbean roots, which was found in 2010 to be using the large snails in its rituals, she said. But many exotic species come into the United States unintentionally in freight or tourists' baggage. 
  
 "If you got a ham sandwich in Jamaica or the Dominican Republic, or an orange, and you didn't eat it all and you bring it back into the States and then you discard it, at some point, things can emerge from those products," Feiber said. 
  
 Authorities are expanding a series of announcements on buses, billboards and in movie theaters urging the public to be on the lookout. 
  
 The last known Florida invasion of the giant mollusks occurred in 1966, when a boy returning to Miami from a vacation in Hawaii brought back three of them, possibly in his jacket pockets. His grandmother eventually released the snails into her garden where the population grew in seven years to 17,000 snails. The state spent $1 million and 10 years eradicating them. 
  
 Feiber said many people unfamiliar with the danger viewed the snails as cute pets. 
  
 "They're huge, they move around, they look like they're looking at you ... communicating with you, and people enjoy them for that," Feiber said. "But they don't realize the devastation they can create if they are released into the environment where they don't have any natural enemies and they thrive." 
  
 (Editing by David Adams and Peter Cooney) |||||

No, this is not a 1970s B-movie: South Florida really is dealing with an invasion of giant African land snails. The beastly mollusks can grow as large as rats (the biggest measure eight inches long, the Ocala Star-Banner reports), and can eat their way through plaster and stucco. More than 1,000 are already being caught per week in Miami-Dade County, and that number is set to swell when the mollusks end their underground hibernation, Reuters reports. Since September 2011, a disturbing 117,000 have been caught. The invasion isn't just gross, it's also problematic, a Florida Department of Agriculture rep explains, because the snails eat "over 500 known species of plants ... pretty much anything that's in their path and green." And that's not all: Their shells can blow out tires; their slime can make sidewalks slick; and they carry a lungworm that can give humans meningitis (though no US cases have been reported). They're also tough to eradicate, since one typically produces about 1,200 eggs per year and can live up to nine years. The last invasion, in 1966, took $1 million—and about a decade—to deal with. Experts from all around the US held a symposium last week to discuss solutions. Among them: stronger bait.