Do Snails have a Breeding Season?

[Anjum]

For the last year+, I thought I must be doing something right because my Ramshorn Snail population just stayed in check without me doing anything. In the last couple months though, the population has absolutely exploded. I've started scouring the tanks for egg masses & removing them. The main change I've made is splitting my single 10 gal tank into 3 separate tanks, a 5G, the 10G & a 29G. Same fish,  just split into the 3 tanks. Were the snails triggered to breed because of the extra space? Do they naturally breed more in the summer months? Or is this just the nature of exponential growth & they're not actually breeding at an increased rate? 

[Colu]

My experience with  ramshorn snails is that they seem to breed year round I haven't noticed much of a difference depending of the time of the year 

[Melkor]

I think snails just breed if the water parameters are good, and there is enough food.  

[Anjum]

I don't *think* I overfeed, but maybe I do. I almost never fast the tanks, maybe I should start doing that once a week. 

[lefty o]

if there is food for them, they are breeding.

[Anjum]

Argh. So how do we keep them in check? I want some, but it's gotten excessive. I don't want snails to be the only thing you see when you look at the tank. 

[Brandon p]

@lefty ois right cut back on feeding. If they are reproducing fast then there is extra food in the tank. It’s easy to fall in to giving the fish more than the can eat quickly. How often do you feed your fish? 

Edited August 6, 2022 by Brandon p

[Anjum]

@Brandon p I feed once a day. 

ETA: I think you hit the nail on the head there w/ feeding more than the fish can eat quickly. It's not necessarily the frequency of feeding, it's that I'm feeding enough quantity to reach the snails. I actually thought I should be feeding enough to get food to them. 

Light bulb moment 😅

Edited August 6, 2022 by Anjum

[Brandon p]

On 8/6/2022 at 2:05 AM, Anjum said:

@Brandon p I feed once a day. 

ETA: I think you hit the nail on the head there w/ feeding more than the fish can eat quickly. It's not necessarily the frequency of feeding, it's that I'm feeding enough quantity to reach the snails. I actually thought I should be feeding enough to get food to them. 

Light bulb moment 😅

Hey, think most of us have had this moment at some point. I feed a 3-4 times a day but only because I have several tanks with fry. So I just put a little bit in all the tanks. There is not reason for that I think you got it. Good luck, and if you have to many and you can’t take you may have to remake some. That’s up to you. 

[Anjum]

Yeah I do think I'll bait some out, put them in a qt tank or outdoor bucket. I'm also strongly considering pea puffers or chain loaches 😅

[lefty o]

reduce feeding, remove some, and you can also add a couple of assassin snails to help keep the numbers in check.

[Guppysnail]

Snails breed according to how much food is available.  Splitting them to 3 tanks means less competition in each tank for food.  Even if you are not overfeeding it is inevitable that more food is being given and not the same exact amount of food being split 3 ways. So more food =more snails. Hope that helps. 

[RonBFree]

I have eight tanks w RH snails.  They keep things cleaned up and yes they do reproduce.  When the snails get big I crush them up and feed them to my fish.  Recycling them as I say.

[Anjum]

Thanks @Guppysnail it does! I realize now just how much snails can reproduce with only a little extra food... 

@RonBFree my tanks are sparkling right now! 😅 I couldn't crush them though... I even feel bad "starving" them out.. 

I hand picked a bunch out last weekend & put them in these 5 gal buckets outside where I put all my extra duckweed & floating plants. Cuz yeah, I can't just throw those away either 🙄 There's still a lot of snails in the tanks, but a tolerable amount. I'll just have to keep a close eye out for egg masses. 

[Guppysnail]

On 8/9/2022 at 1:06 AM, Anjum said:

Thanks @Guppysnail it does! I realize now just how much snails can reproduce with only a little extra food... 

@RonBFree my tanks are sparkling right now! 😅 I couldn't crush them though... I even feel bad "starving" them out.. 

I hand picked a bunch out last weekend & put them in these 5 gal buckets outside where I put all my extra duckweed & floating plants. Cuz yeah, I can't just throw those away either 🙄 There's still a lot of snails in the tanks, but a tolerable amount. I'll just have to keep a close eye out for egg masses. 

Contact local LFS and clubs. They may take them to sell or as puffer food. At least in still the natural order of the food chain. My LFS takes my extra bladder snails I also toss in a clipping bucket. 

[Anjum]

Turns out the Co-Op needs snails! So I'll be making my inaugural trip down this weekend (they're about an hour from me, never been there yet). 

I want to bring them as many as possible so I need to get serious about baiting them so they're easy to gather. A lot of them are really small still, so not easy to hand pick. I have lettuce, kale & cucumber on hand. I can pick up zucchini too. Should I blanch these before putting in the tanks? Any other suggestions for baiting or gathering them? 

[JettsPapa]

On 8/11/2022 at 12:07 PM, Anjum said:

Should I blanch these before putting in the tanks? 

I would.  That helps them sink instead of floating. 

On 8/11/2022 at 12:07 PM, Anjum said:

Any other suggestions for baiting or gathering them? 

You might put the vegetable pieces in a small dish, and when you get ready to take the snail out lift out the dish with the vegetable.  That way any snails that fall off will still be in the dish.

[Anjum]

@JettsPapa awesome thank you! 

[_Eric_]

They only breed on days that end in "Y"

[Anjum]

What I've learned:

Feeding season is Breeding season 🤣

[Anjum]

Another snail breeding question.. 

Do ramshorn snails need to be a certain size or age to reproduce? 

Now that I've added Corydoras (love them 🥰), and figuring they're juvenile since they're so little, I'm feeding more food, and more food that can stay in the tank a while for them to graze. And this will inevitably feed the snails too. I'm thinking I'll take out the largest snails & put them in a tank I can feed more sparingly. And as new ones grow up, remove them before they can reproduce. Just need to know at what point it's best to do this.

[Jenja]

Your fish might've also been doing population control before you spread them to other tanks. I was pleasantly dumbfounded when I watched one of my young female endlers chow down on a bladder snail clutch.

[Anjum]

On 8/19/2022 at 10:30 AM, Jenja said:

Your fish might've also been doing population control before you spread them to other tanks. I was pleasantly dumbfounded when I watched one of my young female endlers chow down on a bladder snail clutch.

I did suspect that might've been the case, and probably was a factor. Before I had an overpopulation, I had a betta, 5 rasboras & 2 SAE in one tank. Any of them could've been eating the egg clutches.