# After 3 weeks I find a snail?



## mlefev (Apr 19, 2005)

I just bought aquarium plants 3 weeks ago. I looked in my tank today and saw a little tiny (about 3/8 inch) brown snail with black spots in my tank. no clue where he came from. Is it ok to have him in there?


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## mlefev (Apr 19, 2005)

take it back, I started looking more, and there are 3 of them. They're tea colored, and basically transparent. Do I have a problem?


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## maxpayne_lhp (Jan 19, 2005)

It should be a problem if there's a burst of such guys. The one you saw may come from some aquatic plants.
If there're still not many, just pick them up. You may also purchase some clownies to take care of them (I suggest more than 6).


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## mlefev (Apr 19, 2005)

Well I'm only running a 10 gal and have it about maxed out for space. I have 3 neon tetras, 3 zebra danios, one platy, and some bizzare looking cory (8 fish in all). I don't think 3 snails is necessarily a problem, but I can't introduce something to take them out, as my tank is pretty well chemically balanced at this point, and adding more fish would create a toxic ammonia load. Would it be ok to have 4 or 5 of the snails and take the rest out by hand? Or would any snails be too many for the tank size I currently own?


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## maxpayne_lhp (Jan 19, 2005)

Okay, no way to add the clownies in! Well, I don't think snails would be a problem if you don't keep plants. Otherwise, just pick them our by hand...


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## MyraVan (Jan 19, 2005)

As far as I can tell, any kind of snail isn't a problem in small numbers. Pond snails are supposed to eat plants, but I have a few of them in my planted tanks and they aren't doing any damage. Probably in large numbers they would. In large numbers any snail will do damage by putting too much bioload into your tank. So I've done snail removal to keep the numbers down.

In my tank with rosy barbs, I had to do very little snail removal. I'm pretty sure that the piggy rosy barbs ate almost all the baby snails! In the tank with the white could mountain minnows I've had to take them out by hand.


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## mlefev (Apr 19, 2005)

I apologize for sounding a bit dense, but I do have about 6 bunches of Rotala Indica and Egeria Najans combined http://www.aquabotanic.com/abstore/index.html

Will plants cause more reproduction? And do you think the fish I currently keep will eat most of the baby snails?


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## Damon (Jan 18, 2005)

Snail population is in direct relation to excess organic matter. The more waste and uneaten food, the more snails. There may be an initial outbreak of snails (I would remove as many as you can to prevent this), but there numbers will fall back to the amount of food available. Pond snails usually won't mess with plants if there is other food available. Still can grow to outrageous numbers. If you don't mind snails all over the tank, leave them alone. If not remove them while their numbers are small and look for snail eggs in your plants and on tank walls.


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## MyraVan (Jan 19, 2005)

At a guess, I would say that your platy would probably eat baby snails. I don't know about danios. My danios are in the tank with my rosy barbs, and the rosies are so piggy that if anything gets eaten odds are that they did it! I would guess that the cory and neons wouldn't do it.

And when maxpayne says "Well, I don't think snails would be a problem if you don't keep plants." I think he's referring to the fact that under some circumstances, pond snails can eat plants. (Although it's also true that you probably wouldn't have snails in the first place if you didn't have plants, as they or their eggs come in on the plants!)


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## Fishfirst (Jan 24, 2005)

If you don't like how they look on the glass I'd take them out... they multiply like crazy. They also get quite a bit bigger... Remove them by hand and you should be good... but be on the lookout.


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## ijedic (Jan 18, 2005)

mlefev said:


> take it back, I started looking more, and there are 3 of them. They're tea colored, and basically transparent. Do I have a problem?


Everytime you see one, take it out. They sound like physids, and multiply like mad! They are unisexual and lay eggs on the plants, very hard to see the eggs. If you've got 3, you've got 30, just varying sizes. About a month after I buy live plants, I have a pufferfood auction!


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## TheOldSalt (Jan 28, 2005)

Gotta concur.
If you don't eradicate them with extreme predjudice, your tank will be utterly overrun with them in a month. They'll even clog up your filter.


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## mlefev (Apr 19, 2005)

Wow, well that's definately something to take into consideration. My platy keeps eating stuff off the plants, so I wonder if it isn't their eggs. I will keep an eye on the situation, and have taken 2 of the three of them out for the time being. I will ask future questions as necessary.


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## ijedic (Jan 18, 2005)

Hi Mlefev,
Snail eggs are very bitter. Usually fish will try them, but the don't often become part of the fish's diet. Most likely your platy is snacking on infusoria. Have a great week, Shannon


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## mlefev (Apr 19, 2005)

Thanks. I plan on keeping tabs on everything going on in that tank. I thought I had washed off the plants so well before introducing them...and basically that's when my problems began...with algae, and now snails. If I see any problem whatsoever with them, they're going out of the tank as soon as I see one. I still have the one in there, and my friend wanted the others I found after my last post for his tank (sounds like he's a glutton for punishment) but we'll see what happens.


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## fish_doc (Jan 31, 2005)

I usually pull a few out of my tanks in the summer and put them in the birdbath and pond outside. The birds love em and they keep the birdbath and pond clean.


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## BigAction (May 21, 2005)

Snails can be good for a tank but often will reproduce out of control causing deaths and unwanted ammonia spikes. A safe way to remove them without using chemicals is somethign called the lettuce trick. Simply take a piece of lettuce and put it in your tank when your light is off. Wake up the next morning and almost all of the snails will be on the piece eating it. Just pick it up and throw it out now. Repeat over a few days to remove all of them.


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## Vivid-Dawn (Jan 18, 2005)

*Aurgh!*

First, my question.
Could I take out my filter for a week or so, and be okay with daily 10% water changes?

I have this snail problem too. I wouldn't mind so much, if it was an apple/mystery snail that's breeding, since I like their looks (and you can actually see them decently!)
These snails are itsy bitsy, and SO MANY!! It makes my tank look infested, in my opinion, which is bad...both aesthetically and - as somebody said - might cause ammonia spikes and other problems.

I've done just about every method I can think of, to get rid of them. Taking the bigger ones that I can see out by hand. I have found a few egg sacks if the light hits them just right, and I take those out. I would gravel the vacuum once a week, but that didn't seem to help any (I did about half the area, so that not too much bacteria would be taken).

Now I've resorted to totally stripping down my tank. Took out ALL the gravel, all my decorations, even my aerator bubble-maker thing, because the snails seemed to like that. And as Old Salt pointed out, they clog my filter. Which is what this post is about.
Maybe taking my filter out and keeping it in a dry place will kill off the snails from dehydration? Every time I take out my filter (bi-monthly) to wash it out, I find at _least_ a dozen snails, and last time, I found 3 egg sacks.

I have no other established/cycled tanks to put my fish, otherwise I'd do a bleach cleaning on stuff while my filter dries out and kills all the hiding ones.


I know to quarantine fish, but now I think I'll also quarantine my plants, just so I can at least try to rid the snails from them before putting new plants in my fish tank!


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## ijedic (Jan 18, 2005)

My bettas love them! In order to accomidate my red cherry shrimp, I moved my bettas to physid tanks. They cleaned them out fast! Adding a betta takes up a lot less space than a loach, and aren't as mean as puffers. Have fun, Shannon


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## mlefev (Apr 19, 2005)

Geesh, I just hope I don't end up with a snail epidemic. Im trying to look everything over daily to see if I'm getting any more. So far I'm good, but it's only been a few days.


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## fish_doc (Jan 31, 2005)

Whatever you do please dont use products like snail-rid. I tried it once and lost most the fish in the tank and the snails seemed to increase in numbers.


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## ALFA WOLF (May 24, 2005)

Sry to hear abotu your lose, but i think that after a few days your would have seen some more snails. I had one large snail once it died and in return it gave me about 70 other little suckers.


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## mlefev (Apr 19, 2005)

One more snail question...I've got 2 of them in here..and have been getting rid of any others I see. They're on the plants, but they only seem to be eating the dead stuff off them. Is that good, or are they going to much the whole plant if they get hungry?


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## MyraVan (Jan 19, 2005)

Yes, it is good that they are cleaning up your plants. I think the real danger with snails is overpopulation overwhelming your filtration. I have heard that the pond snails will attack your plants when they get hugry, but MTS and the little ramshorns won't. I don't have any experiences with any snails eating plants: I bought apple snails that don't eat plants and try to keep pest snails under control by removing all I see.


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