Snails

Okay Guys, I've searched the archives for info about snails, but I'm still as confuzzed as ever!

I got snails in my aquarium, and as a gardener, when I see a snail, I step on it. These little beastiess in my tank are chowing up what few plants I have.

I suspect they hitch-hiked in on some plants. I know I SHOULD HAVE and COULD HAVE sanitized the plants before adding them to the aquarium, but like my Daddy always told me "... SHOULD HAVE and COULD HAVE are both dead... The question is what are you going to do NOW!??"

My answer then as it is now is simply a gormless expression and a vague "Duh!!?" :wondering:

I don't know what kind they are (in fact I wouldn't know a rams horn or a Malaysian trumpet from a vu-vu-zella) My eyes are not what they used to be, for me they're just a little brown dot on the glass or a little lump on my plants.

So far, I've been handling the problem with an early morning and evening "swim" and catching them by hand. I've tried some suggested ways of trapping them with only moderate success.

Okay, Questions:

1. Should I make peace with them, and just let them be?

2. How can I stop them chowing up my plants? should I feed my fish MORE, so that there is food left for the snails to eat and thus they may spare my plants? Should I remove my plants and feed less and so hope to starve the little beasties?

3. Should I move the fish to another tank, clean and sanitize, and start all over again?

4. Should I just suck it up and keep on with my "swimming lessons"?

TIA :wondering:

 

Look for the snails eggs on plant leaves and remove them.
Second you can get a loach (they eat snails)

Cheers

 

Noodle, I personally have made peace with the little critters. Granted they do breed like, well snails, and I need to keep it under control every once in a while. I simply do this my removing them by hand when I do my weekly maintenance. What I have personally found to work best is:

An hour before you want to do maintanance, turn the lights of y our tank off, close the curtains. This will draw the snails out, because they are usually active at night, as you are more than likely aware. Then when you do your maintancence, remove via your swimming lessons.

The Malaysian Trumpet snail is actually a nice to have, in moderation, because it turns over the substrate, and prevents your substrate from becoming anaerobic.

Personally, I do not have a problem with snails eating my plants, but I could not tell you how I keep this right. The snails help to a very small degree with the control of certain algae, but never rely on snails for this purpose.

As Brads has also said, you could get a "Clown Loach" fish. They eat the snails. They however struggle a bit with the Malaysian Trumpe snails, because of their hard shells. They are also nice fish to have as an addition to a community tank... and if memory serves me correctly, the like to be in schools (6 or more), and I know in Jozi, some LPS sell them at R100.00 per fish, so this could be costly just for snail control.

 

I just put letuce in my tank,they will eat the piece of letuce and leave the the plants alone.(replace every 4 days)(If you want to get rid of them you can still place the letuce in the tank,the next day most of them will be on the letuce which you can take out and dispose of it with the snails,repeat daily to get rid of all the snails)

 

Hi Noodle,
What i did on my old tank when i had a snail problem was,
I took 2 pieces of lettice ,
Placed them at the bottom of the tank and coverd them with a saucer . leaving a little gap.
Kept it like that overnight. I did this everyday for about a week,

What you find is that the snails eat the lettice and attach themselfs to it making it easier for us to remove them.
Im not sure if it would remove 100% of the snails but it did help me.

 

what fish do u have in your tank?

wish i had some snails in my tank

 

I have a few clown loaches in my tank and they work great in keeping the snails under control!! There has been a significant decrease in the amount of snails since I added the loaches!!

Hope this helps!

 

hi Noodle,
gettting rid of the pest is going to take quite a while and all the above advice is very good but I want to caution you against the use of clown loaches as a way of controlling the snail population. While I am a huge fan of the species, they are highly susceptible to Ich (which could obviously pose a greater problem to your tank) and it is advisable to keep them in groups of at least 5 (they have a very complex social dynamic). Another issue is that they grow fairly large (20cm - 30cm)and it is not a given that they will eat the snails, though they mostly do. If you want to go the loach route I would suggest getting zebra loaches (Botia Striata) which grow to about 10cm though the same applies with regards to keeping them in groups.

 

I agree with Zoom. You will also notice if you move your substrate to another tank, you'll find these guys popping up. I would suggest using lettuce or taking them out manually. Loaches need alot of tank space and are very boisterous, so i do not think a 2ft tank is suitable for them( i presume you are refering to the tank in your public profile?). IMO i think these snails look cool

 

A Skunk Botia/Hora's Loach has sorted my snail problem out quickly. It cost me R35 and they are rather peaceful fish.

 

For looks i would still go with a clown loach instead for snails

 

As discussed previously you should never get "a" clown loach. Group of 5 or more, otherwise they get stressed out and develop ich quite quickly. Also, clown loaches are much happier when the temperature is on the higher side, around 28 to 29, which is probably not suitable to the community tank. Rather get the smaller zebra loach, but once again, also a group of 5.

 

sera has a tablet product that kills snails,try get it

cheers

 

I would steer away from "snail poisons"...most likely contains something that could harm your fish / plants

 

Thanx for the tips guys! I've tried the tips using the lettuce leaves, and it worked quite well.

Things seem to be a little more under control lately, and there's not so many of the little blighters chowing up my plants or hanging on the glass as there were before.

As for the Loaches, I would love nothing more than getting a bunch of those, but unfortunately, my tanks are all pretty well fully populated.

At the moment, I have 3 x 60cm tanks (a community tank with Black Phantoms, Harlequins and neons, Plus a couple of Peppered Cories and algae eaters. A tank of guppies and a tank of Mollies.) and a 45cm tank with a whole bunch of juvenile guppies.

What I really need is more tanks!

BTW, I scratched a bit through the substrate, and I found what I think are a few Malaysian Trumpet snails and following advice, I've let them be.

 

If you found a few trumpet snails...get rid of them now while you can. Pretty soon you will have millions. Personally I don't like them they do nothing for me. With regards the ramshorn and pond snails, you will find that eventually a balance will be reached in your tank and the population will remain more or less steady.

 

agreed!

 

Which snails breed most rapidly i just got an idea.