Freshwater snails

[campingdude84]

My tank is established. Has been for over three years now.

When I first got plants, there were a couple snails/eggs that I didn’t spot. Eventually, I had hundreds of ramshorn snails.

I would place boiled cucumbers on the bottom to attract the snails, and dispose of them when they proliferated the tank too much.

After over two years, all of a sudden the ramshorn snails started eating my plants.

I bought some assassin snails, and they killed every ramshorn snail in the tank, and then died off.

I have not seen a single living snail in the tank for half a year now.

My tank is 29 gallons, is planted, and contains community fish such as endlers, guppies, tetras, and rasboras.

Without snails, I have noticed of late a lot of detritus on the bottom of the tank and some algae growth. I had neither of those things when the snails were alive.

A long story to ask:

What snails should I get for the tank?

What kind won’t eat my plants?

Are there other ways to control their proliferation other than get rid of the eggs when you see them and attract them to some veggies to remove some of them?

Where can I get snails on the cheap?

thank you! 

[AllFishNoBrakes]

On 10/19/2023 at 2:23 PM, campingdude84 said:

Without snails, I have noticed of late a lot of detritus on the bottom of the tank and some algae growth. I had neither of those things when the snails were alive.

Yup! That’s the beauty of snails! I wish I could keep snails in my Pea Puffer tank. It absolutely had the most algae and takes the most manual cleaning as snails are food for the Puffers. 

On 10/19/2023 at 2:23 PM, campingdude84 said:

What snails should I get for the tank?

Depends on what your needs are. In my opinion and experience, they’re all just a little bit different. Everything has their pros and cons. 
 

-Nerites: Look cool, bunch of different types and colors, eat diatom algae and some other types. Cannot reproduce in fresh water, but females will absolutely lay eggs that look like sesame seeds in your tank. Can be difficult to get them to eat dry and prepared foods. 
 

-Mystery: Look cool, tons of colors, get big and can have a big bioload. Reproduce in freshwater, but it takes effort to hatch the clutches of eggs. Clutches can be easily removed to hatch or dispose of if you don’t want more. Will more readily eat dry and prepared foods. 
 

-Ramshorn: Look cool, lots of different colors of both Shell and foot, but can grow to be a problem if you over feed, or provide excess food sources. I love Ramshorns and manage them with my Pea Puffers. 
 

-Bladder: The other pest snail, really just like smaller Ramshorns if you ask me. They can overpopulate due to how much food (intentional or not) is provided. 
 

On 10/19/2023 at 2:23 PM, campingdude84 said:

What kind won’t eat my plants?

I’ve had all the snails listed above and I’ve never seen them actively eating healthy plants, but outside of the Nerites they will all eat dying and unhealthy plants. I actually see that as a benefit, but it can absolutely add to population explosions by allowing them a never ending buffet of dying or dead plant matter and mulm. 
 

On 10/19/2023 at 2:23 PM, campingdude84 said:

Are there other ways to control their proliferation other than get rid of the eggs when you see them and attract them to some veggies to remove some of them?

-Nerites: Cannot breed in freshwater, but females will lay eggs in freshwater. 
 

-Mystery: Can absolutely breed in freshwater, but the clutch can easily be removed. Takes a little effort to hatch and raise them. Females can lay fertile clutches if they were ever with males and became fertile. Meaning, you could buy a female from a store, only have the 1 snail in your tank, and still get fertile clutches from that female. 
 

-Ramshorn and Bladder: All comes down to how much food is available, whether intentional or not. Detritus/mulm, decaying plants and leaves, dead fish or other dead snails, as well as excess fish food are all sources for them to thrive and multiply. You can control their population via controlling food sources, manual removal, or feeding them to other things that will eat them. My Pleco grow out tank is absolutely crawling with baby ramshorns, but they just get fed to my Pea Puffers. My 20 high and 55 Angel tank have just a few to help with algae and general clean up. 
 

On 10/19/2023 at 2:23 PM, campingdude84 said:

Where can I get snails on the cheap?

All comes down to what you want. I got my initial Bladder snails for free from plants. I bought some ramshorns from another hobbyist for super cheap and will never need to buy them again. Mystery’s and Nerites can be purchased from big box stores or fish stores for relatively cheap.
 

All of this comes down to what you’re trying to accomplish! 

[MattyM]

I have never had snails of any kind eat plants, they do eat the dying/dead parts of plants - but I have never seem them eat plants so I can't help there. What kind of plants were getting eaten? 

The easiest way to control snails is to not overfeed. This could explain your current detritus and algae problems. Vacuuming that up/more water changes might help.

Nerite snails might be good for you - the olive "army-helmet" ones seem to be hardy and get down to business cleaning the tank. And while they lay eggs they will never hatch in a fresh water environment (they need brackish water). If you have a local store that sells them I would buy there since the water will be similar to yours. Otherwise you can find them online (I don't think we're allowed to list vendors here outside AC and Amazon). 

The ramshorns I have are the colored kind - red/pink/white/grey/etc - I think they are cool. 

Good luck - I actually love snails of all kinds 🐌

[lefty o]

im fairly anti snail, but i keep a few nerites in my tanks. the only downside to them are the eggs they leave behind.

[campingdude84]

I don’t have any kind of fish that will eat snails. The tank is a community tank with Cory, Pygmy cats, bristlenose, Cardinal tetras, blue and yellow endlers, some rasbora, and make guppies.

i also have three Japanese algae that I wish weren’t suggested to me when I started the tank. They are all about 5 inches long now. They never stop moving around. They like to stir up the substrate.

I feed the cory, Pygmy cats, algae eaters, and bristlenose plecos sinking bug bites. They go nuts for them, and they are gone in minutes.

I feed the other fish once a day what they can eat within 2-3 minutes.

so, I don’t think I am over feeding the fish.

 

im leaning toward lane getting mystery snails.

I had ramshorn and bladder before from plants I bought from a guy nearby who sells aquatic stuff. They just got out of control over the course of two years. I’d remove 40-50 at a time about once every month. Just too many of them.

I don’t have anything to feed them to.

 

if I were to get mystery snails from the local pet store, how many should I get to help clean up a 29 gallon tank?

 

thanks!

[campingdude84]

Or, if I were to get nerite snails, how many for a 29 gallon tank?

 

how long do nerite snails live?

 

how long do mystery snails live?

[Shrimptanks]

I highly recommend nerite snails, as they cannot reproduce as others have said.  For a 29 gallon, 2-4 wouldn't be a bad idea.  They're great algae eaters. 

NGL I never even bothered with mystery snails cause I don't like how their eggs look.  Grosses me out.

Seemingly you can keep ramshorn snail populations under control, but I find pond/ramshorns will proliferate no matter what happens.   If you've been bothered by them before enough to use assassin snails to nuke them, I wouldn't introduce them again.

 

 

[campingdude84]

I purchased five nerite snails for the 29 gallon tank.

[Cinnebuns]

I'm going to give you some positives and negatives for many snails. Nerite and mystery snails are most common but are not your only options. All the pictures I'm including are snails I have or have had in the past. Some I bred. 

Nerite:

-  Will not reproduce in freshwater. 

-  Females will leave eggs around which may need to be cleaned off. 

-  The best snail for eating algae. 

-  Wont eat extra food or plant matter. 

-  Can be difficult to feed after all of the algae is gone. They will only eat natural algae, driftwood, cholla wood, and leaves. 

-  All are wild caught so, depending on your source, they may not make it past a month.  This is because some do not adapt well to captive life. If they do make it over 2 months they likely will live for 5 or more years. Since they are wild caught, it's hard to know their age when you get them. 

-  Dozens of species with different behaviors, tendencies, colors and patterns. 

 

Mystery:

-  Will eat a lot and therefore are very good for eating extra food and dead plant matter. 

-  Will not eat much algae. 

-  They can get large and can have a large bioload to go with it. 

-  They have more specialized requirements in terms of diet and will require direct feeding of food containing protein and calcium. 

-  Come in many colors. 

-  Can have quirky personality and honestly are the most entertaining of any snail. 

-  Can reproduce in freshwater but require a male and a female to do so. They lay eggs above the water line which are easily removed. 

-  They tend to live 1-2 years. 

 

Trapdoor:

-  Will eat extra food, dead plant matter, and some algae. 

-  Not as high of a bioload and appetite as mystery snails but similar size. 

-  A few different species and colors to choose from including:  Japanese, Chinese, American, striped and white wizards.  None have as much color options as other snails. 

-  They do reproduce in freshwater but very slowly. They are live bearers with a 9 month gestation. They will have between 2-20 every 9 months. This does require both a male and a female to do so can be avoided by keeping all males or all females. They are easy to sex. 

-  Not as interesting personality as mystery snails. 

-  Tend to live 5 years. 

Male snails have 1 long straight and 1 short curled antenna

Females have 2 straight long antenna 

 

Rabbit:

-    Will eat extra food, dead plant matter, and some algae. 

-  Not as high of a bioload and appetite as mystery snails but similar size. 

-  These also reproduce similar to trapdoor snails. They require a male and a female but are impossible to sex. They do reproduce very slowly though and have 1-3 at a time. 

-  Come in many colors and even in mini!!

-  Can be interesting to watch how they walk. 

-  Tend to live 3 years.  

This is a mini rabbit snail. I have had full sized ones in the past but I couldn't find a picture. 

Edited October 20, 2023 by Cinnebuns

[campingdude84]

After seeing more information from Cinnabuns about the different kinds of snails and what they eat, I went and grabbed a couple mystery snails as well yesterday to help eat excess waste and food.

Once they were out in the bag from the pet store and subsequently added to my tank, they are floating at the top.

they are alive. When I pick them up they move.

Why are they floating at the top instead of dropping down and suctioning to the inside of the tank?

[Cinnebuns]

On 10/21/2023 at 10:32 AM, campingdude84 said:

After seeing more information from Cinnabuns about the different kinds of snails and what they eat, I went and grabbed a couple mystery snails as well yesterday to help eat excess waste and food.

Once they were out in the bag from the pet store and subsequently added to my tank, they are floating at the top.

they are alive. When I pick them up they move.

Why are they floating at the top instead of dropping down and suctioning to the inside of the tank?

Mystery snails float by trapping water into their shell either intentionally or unintentionally. In the wild they will intentionally do this if there is something about the environment they don't like in hopes of floating to a different location.  My guess is that they are adjusting to a new tank and just need some time. If it continues you can test parameters or try to explore other things that may be bothering them. You can also try giving them an air bath which may encourage the air to come out although it should not be needed. 

[Tanked]

 

On 10/19/2023 at 5:13 PM, AllFishNoBrakes said:

Yup! That’s the beauty of snails! I wish I could keep snails in my Pea Puffer tank. It absolutely had the most algae and takes the most manual cleaning as snails are food for the Puffers. 

Depends on what your needs are. In my opinion and experience, they’re all just a little bit different. Everything has their pros and cons. 
 

-Nerites: Look cool, bunch of different types and colors, eat diatom algae and some other types. Cannot reproduce in fresh water, but females will absolutely lay eggs that look like sesame seeds in your tank. Can be difficult to get them to eat dry and prepared foods. 
 

-Mystery: Look cool, tons of colors, get big and can have a big bioload. Reproduce in freshwater, but it takes effort to hatch the clutches of eggs. Clutches can be easily removed to hatch or dispose of if you don’t want more. Will more readily eat dry and prepared foods. 
 

-Ramshorn: Look cool, lots of different colors of both Shell and foot, but can grow to be a problem if you over feed, or provide excess food sources. I love Ramshorns and manage them with my Pea Puffers. 
 

-Bladder: The other pest snail, really just like smaller Ramshorns if you ask me. They can overpopulate due to how much food (intentional or not) is provided. 
 

I’ve had all the snails listed above and I’ve never seen them actively eating healthy plants, but outside of the Nerites they will all eat dying and unhealthy plants. I actually see that as a benefit, but it can absolutely add to population explosions by allowing them a never ending buffet of dying or dead plant matter and mulm. 
 

-Nerites: Cannot breed in freshwater, but females will lay eggs in freshwater. 
 

-Mystery: Can absolutely breed in freshwater, but the clutch can easily be removed. Takes a little effort to hatch and raise them. Females can lay fertile clutches if they were ever with males and became fertile. Meaning, you could buy a female from a store, only have the 1 snail in your tank, and still get fertile clutches from that female. 
 

-Ramshorn and Bladder: All comes down to how much food is available, whether intentional or not. Detritus/mulm, decaying plants and leaves, dead fish or other dead snails, as well as excess fish food are all sources for them to thrive and multiply. You can control their population via controlling food sources, manual removal, or feeding them to other things that will eat them. My Pleco grow out tank is absolutely crawling with baby ramshorns, but they just get fed to my Pea Puffers. My 20 high and 55 Angel tank have just a few to help with algae and general clean up. 
 

All comes down to what you want. I got my initial Bladder snails for free from plants. I bought some ramshorns from another hobbyist for super cheap and will never need to buy them again. Mystery’s and Nerites can be purchased from big box stores or fish stores for relatively cheap.
 

All of this comes down to what you’re trying to accomplish! 

What about the other, other pest snail: Malaysian Trumpet Snail?  At least they are interesting to watch when they rise up out of the substrate.  I've never seen one on a plant.

[AllFishNoBrakes]

@Tanked I’ve never kept MTS, so I didn’t feel comfortable commenting on them having never had first hand experience with them. Definitely another option, though!

[Kit Craft]

Just a note from another new snail owner. My mystery snail seems to dislike light. I had to filter my tank lights down to about 40-60% with window screen replacement (my java ferns were happy about that too). Anyway, mine is a purple who has double in size in just over two weeks (told you I was new to snails). It cleaned up any melting on my new plants too, which is nice. Always on my plants or driftwood. Never eats anything healthy though. One downside, this thing is a poop machine and I have light colored sand!

 

Sorry, nothing really helpful to add other than my snail likes it dark. But, I hope you enjoy your snail! They are super fun to watch, and my plants seem healthier now.