Snails

[Streetwise]

I am used to bladder snails, and I have read about other snails, but I now have hitchhiker ramshorn snails in my tubs and I want to know more. I found this video from Cory, but let's have a chat about snails.

 

[DaveSamsell]

On 7/26/2020 at 2:23 AM, Streetwise said:

I am used to bladder snails, and I have read about other snails, but I now have hitchhiker ramshorn snails in my tubs and I want to know more. I found this video from Cory, but let's have a chat about snails.

 

That's a great video.  Snails will usually only populate in proportion to their food supply.  Personally, I really like snails in my aquariums.  Many benefits.  I have Nerite, Pond, Bladder, Malaysian Trumpet & Mystery snails.  It's always fun to turn on the lights in the morning & see what is really in the tanks.  😊  🐌🐌  🍀🍁 🐌🐌 🐌

[RovingGinger]

I have ramshorn, MTS, one mystery snail, and bladder snails. The bladder snails are puffer food due to their reckless procreation habits and the others are just cute helpers. 
 

I had two mystery snails, but one was just laying half out of its shell and the next day I found an empty snail and a partially eaten naked snail body. Really gross at that size. Old age? I didn’t see fish picking on it while alive and nothing else has died in the aquarium....

[Daniel]

2 minutes ago, RovingGinger said:

I had two mystery snails, but one was just laying half out of its shell and the next day I found an empty snail and a partially eaten naked snail body. 

The mystery of the mysterious death of the mystery snail...

[shkote]

It used to be a hobby of mine to source and collect as many different types of nerite snails as I could and document the species names, difference in behavior and preferred living situation. By far the cutest and most interesting was the Neritina pulligera. Here is a photo of one of my old "Dusky" nerites. 

 

[tfwvusa]

2 hours ago, RovingGinger said:

I have ramshorn, MTS, one mystery snail, and bladder snails. The bladder snails are puffer food due to their reckless procreation habits and the others are just cute helpers. 
 

I had two mystery snails, but one was just laying half out of its shell and the next day I found an empty snail and a partially eaten naked snail body. Really gross at that size. Old age? I didn’t see fish picking on it while alive and nothing else has died in the aquarium....

Thank you so much for listing your snails. I have been trying to figure out for the longest time what the little snails were that came on my plants from the fish store. Now I know they are bladder snails! Seems silly to be so excited over but I really like knowing what everything in my tanks are.

[H.K.Luterman]

I started off with just Malaysian trumpet snails to help keep the sand in my planted tanks "aerated." Then I got a pea puffer, and decided to breed snails for him to eat. So I decided since I was going to breed them, I might as well get ones I thought were cute. So now I have a 5 gallon devoted to pink ramshorns, and I enjoy them so much, I rarely use them as puffer food - I usually just give him bladder snails that have hitchhiked into my tanks and multiplied.

I also keep a nerite in each tank, since they do such a good job at eating algae. 

Now I want to breed mystery snails, :3

[TheDukeAnumber1]

Love snails, specifically ramshorn and MTS.

Ramshorns are hermaphroditic and lay eggs similar to pond snails, they have thin shells, no trap door cover, have several color morphs and patterns, they have hemoglobin in their blood so it's actually red, and they often keep a little bubble in their shell so they can float but they will push it out and sink if they get bothered enough.

And IMO MTS are the perfect partner snail to ramshorns. They are male/female and give birth to live snails, have thick shells, they have a trap door cover, and best of all they burro into the top 3/8" of the substrate and slowly churn the top layer.

[Cory]

I like ramshorn snails quite a bit. I prefer the pink ones which are just really ones with translucent shells. 

[Brandy]

Hmmm... @Cory Interesting that you would say that, since those just magically appeared in my tank after receiving plants from Aquarium Co-op! Lol, thanks for the bonus. 

(It's not a bug, it's a feature!)

[Brandy]

In other news, I need to make friends with a Seattlite who owns a pea puffer....

[Robin]

6 hours ago, H.K.Luterman said:

I started off with just Malaysian trumpet snails to help keep the sand in my planted tanks "aerated." Then I got a pea puffer, and decided to breed snails for him to eat. So I decided since I was going to breed them, I might as well get ones I thought were cute. So now I have a 5 gallon devoted to pink ramshorns, and I enjoy them so much, I rarely use them as puffer food - I usually just give him bladder snails that have hitchhiked into my tanks and multiplied.

I also keep a nerite in each tank, since they do such a good job at eating algae. 

Now I want to breed mystery snails, :3

I love this picture. It might be worth raising snails just so I can feed them the duckweed.

[Tiffany]

I have nerites and they burrow under my gravel..??

I feed green beans and algae wafers as well as have some algae growth around the tank..guess they are just special..

Also..what kind of small snail come in aquarium coop plants? I will go research he snail video to see the difference between small snails.

Edited July 27, 2020 by Tiffany

[Kat_Rigel]

I panicked when snails infiltrated my planted aquarium, so I bought assassin snails. Jokes on me; they are a sustaining colony now and I will never be able to remove them all. 🤷‍♀️ I wish I had just let them run their course so that I could put my mysteries in there now, but hey, live and learn (Not interested in risking my mysteries.)

[Torrey]

Reviving this thread, rather than start a new topic.

Once upon a time, I fell for the propaganda of the fish police, and dipped all plants in either H2O2 or alum, washed everything, and missed out on 80% of the joy lost in my paranoia over "pest snails".

My spouse telling me stories of growing up with their grandmother, and explaining why they didn't like fish, fish tanks, or frogs didn't exactly help me develop a fondness for snails, and the plethora of misinformation didn't help.

Luckily, my kids found Cory on YouTube via a link from GamerGirl (aka Girl Talks Fish, aka Irene) and we have been a reformed family ever since.

Originally, all snails were fed to Karma (kids' turtle), now I have multiple species in every tank, and most we put in on purpose!

As for the snail who terrorized my spouse as a child?

Pomacea canaliculata

Not even allowed to be sold, or cross state lines.

Yes, they get to be 6".

What I have not been able to find in any of the literature, is how often do they become carnivorous?

Because that was a good portion of the resistance to indoor fish:

Apparently abuela's Golden Pomacea canaliculata

snail would climb out of the tank and 'reach' for anyone who got close enough... which was terrifying to a young child after watching the snail 'grab' one of abuela's ranchu and taking out a chunk... which both my spouse and brother-in-law swear happened. 

Has anyone heard of any snail eating live food, outside of assassin snails?

I was shown a picture tonight, and 90% sure abuela had a Pomacea canaliculata. 

[Fonske]

On 4/8/2022 at 12:18 PM, Torrey said:

snail would climb out of the tank and 'reach' for anyone who got close enough... which was terrifying to a young child after watching the snail 'grab' one of abuela's ranchu and taking out a chunk...

I'm not a snail expert so can't be sure for 100%, but I think my snails were golden apples (pictures below). About 2.5" in diameter, very pretty. When I tried to keep them with fish, exactly the opposite was happening, i.e. fishes were constantly trying to take a chunk out of the snails. The snails were only interested (very interested) in eating my precious live plants so I had to evict them to a snail only tank promptly.

I can confirm the "climb out of the tank" part thought, I had to put heavy weights on the tank lid to keep the snails inside. They also liked to eat chicken meat as well as all kinds of plants.

 

[Cinnebuns]

This picture is what I thought of when you described how big the snails got. 

Idk how accurate it is but I have heard of snails TRYING to eat live food but not able to catch it since the food is often faster and more agile than them. 

[Torrey]

@Fonske that rings true, abuela fed hers hot dogs, lettuce, carrots, and once caught a fish (wondering if it was already sick, now that my spouse is finally working past the issues surrounding aquariums... apparently it was a lionhead ~ the size of a desert plate).

Cinnebuns, that looks exactly right size and shape! Spouse said white where the darker lines are, and a creamy gold and pale yellow for the rest of the shell. Whitish (yellow tinted) pseudopod and flesh.

Thank you to everyone helping to solve this mystery!