Pest snails... best management tips & tricks?

[BeetleLann]

Hey fishy friends,

I have my first infestation of what I think are Malaysian trumpet snails!!! (or something similar)

I don't have the option to remove and quarantine everything. Thinking of trying the "drop in some cucumber or zucchini overnight and try to collect as many as possible" approach, but this doesn't help with eggs.

Care to share any tips or tricks you've used to manage a snail problem?

Cheers!

[Mmiller2001]

That approach is good. Controlling the amount of food you put in the tank really helps as well. I'd imagine a combination of those will keep them well under control.

[Scapexghost]

Snails are beneficial so unless you hate looking at them id let them be. Snail populations will settle overtime. 

[Sweetpickles]

We like snails too but sometimes they get a little out of control. So in goes a cucumber slice! Works everytime!

[GameCzar]

We've been using snails to fight the pest snail problem.   I've been surprised at how much fun it is to breed assassin snails.  
Now we're going to have to use a tank to propagate bladder snails for food 😉

[BeetleLann]

@GameCzarI was hoping someone was going to say something positive about assassin snails! That might be my next step... hehe. Good luck with your bladder snails!

@Sweetpickles excellent, I am glad to know this has worked for you!!! Excited to try it out tonight now 🙂

@Scapexghost Ooh, that's good to know! They are all mixed in with the substrate, but as long as that's okay, I will learn to love them like I did with my scuds in the other tank lol ...

@Mmiller2001 Thank you! I will try to reduce feeding, too.

Thank you everyone 🙂 🙂 🙂

 

[GameCzar]

I love the little buggers, and they will fight the good fight for you! 🙂 

[Dawn T]

On 12/5/2021 at 4:46 PM, GameCzar said:

We've been using snails to fight the pest snail problem.   I've been surprised at how much fun it is to breed assassin snails.  
Now we're going to have to use a tank to propagate bladder snails for food 😉

LOL Same here! I've got ramshorn and bladder snails going in all of my tanks. I actually OVERFEED one of the tanks to make those puppies proliferate. That's also the tank I have assassin snails in. Nice little ecosystem going in there.

Also, I have a friend who tends to overfeed their tank all the time, so "pest" snails are VERY happy in there. I use a snail trap to catch them regularly and toss them into the tank with my assassins.

Since assassins need a member of each sex in order to breed, I also keep a single assassin in each of my smaller tanks to keep snail populations under control in those tanks. A single assassin snail does a nice job on crowd control in a small tank.

One of these days, I want to add Malaysian Trumpet Snails to my tanks. They're so great at keeping sandy substrates from compacting. I just haven't made up my mind if I want them or something like Kuhlii loaches.

[BeetleLann]

On 12/5/2021 at 7:00 PM, Dawn T said:

LOL Same here! I've got ramshorn and bladder snails going in all of my tanks. I actually OVERFEED one of the tanks to make those puppies proliferate. That's also the tank I have assassin snails in. Nice little ecosystem going in there.

Also, I have a friend who tends to overfeed their tank all the time, so "pest" snails are VERY happy in there. I use a snail trap to catch them regularly and toss them into the tank with my assassins.

Since assassins need a member of each sex in order to breed, I also keep a single assassin in each of my smaller tanks to keep snail populations under control in those tanks. A single assassin snail does a nice job on crowd control in a small tank.

One of these days, I want to add Malaysian Trumpet Snails to my tanks. They're so great at keeping sandy substrates from compacting. I just haven't made up my mind if I want them or something like Kuhlii loaches.

I love this! Poor little guys in my tank are in the wrong environment, I didn't know they like sandy substrate. I've been meaning to redo my tank because it's ugly- not sure I will yet- but if I do, adding sand sounds like a good idea.

[Dawn T]

MTS will do sand as well as gravel. They aren't the least bit picky. They're just great little additions to a tank to keep sand from getting compacted, that's all.