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Snails!

Joined
10 Jun 2007
Messages
961
Location
Dorset, UK
I just love snails, they leave your plants alone, and they stuff all the algae they can find! At the moment I have 2 nerite stripy jobs, and Ive just ordered these amazingly cool purple apple snails.

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Isnt that amazing!

Im hoping I might get these guys to breed, unfortunately, Nerite snails need a period in salt water for their eggs to be fertile.

http://www.snailshop.ashopcommerce.co.uk/ good supplier, used them before for shrimps and snails alike.
 
Lovely snails and have often been tempted if it wasn't for those blinking hard to remove eggs they leave all over the place.

James
 
Nerites are really cool. I myself have never experienced the hard eggs, but at the LFS I used to work at I saw the eggs.
I have 2 Thick Striped Zebras. Those Apple Snails look lovely.

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I love my nerites, Im always amazed at just how fast they can cross a tank.. one minute you look at your tank and their in one corner, the next minute, theyre feet away! Unfortunatly I lost 2 of mine early on, I never really figured out what the cause was, its not like they didnt have enough algae to eat!

All my snails and especially my Otto's all love a great big chunk of cucumber weighted down, it takes about 1 day for them to devour a 2 inch piece, skin and all. Alot of my fish will go for it as well, specially rosey barbs who love to eat the softer, seedy middle bit out.
 
I could be wrong here but i'm pretty sure apple snails climb up out of the water and lay there eggs so you'll have to keep an eye out for them. They can be removed to prevent predation from your fish. I believe they are not too hard to breed.
 
yep, apple snails need about 6 inches of air above the tank, and theyll lay their eggs in batches. So long as you have a male/female apple snail then you should be able to breed them quite easily. Apple snails are one of the few species of snail that are'nt asexual.
 
apple snails are a nice addition to any tank that doesnt house loaches..lol.. they require harder water conditions other wise a calcium liquid would be wise to put in the water. a ph above 7 is needed, i keep mine at 7.4-7.6. they will eat dead or decaying plants not live healthy plants. you need both m and f to breed these and they lay there eggs above the water line.

just my 2 pence..

regards postage Gratts, i post mine wrapped in wet paper towels and packed in polystirean (sp) cups. wrapped in bubble wrapp then packing paper....jobs a good un. never had a doa....they can stay out of water for about 2 weeks tucked in there shells.
 
So Nerites, apple and malaysian trumpet snails will all avoid healthy plants (provided there's other stuff to eat) are there any others which are suitable for a planted tank? Maybe we should have a snail guide!
 
Egmel said:
So Nerites, apple and malaysian trumpet snails will all avoid healthy plants (provided there's other stuff to eat) are there any others which are suitable for a planted tank? Maybe we should have a snail guide!

all the snails Ive owned have all avoided any plants.. even when theres no algae theyll starve before they eat the plants. Which is a common cause of death unfortunately. People forget to feed them and they flake out pretty fast, especially if theyre big. Apple snails need alot of food, at one time I had 5 who used to eat 3 inches of cucumber every 2 days!
 
Matt Holbrook-Bull said:
Egmel said:
So Nerites, apple and malaysian trumpet snails will all avoid healthy plants (provided there's other stuff to eat) are there any others which are suitable for a planted tank? Maybe we should have a snail guide!

all the snails Ive owned have all avoided any plants.. even when theres no algae theyll starve before they eat the plants. Which is a common cause of death unfortunately. People forget to feed them and they flake out pretty fast, especially if theyre big. Apple snails need alot of food, at one time I had 5 who used to eat 3 inches of cucumber every 2 days!
Cool, I've been looking at that snail-shop link, they've got some beauties, I'm really tempted.

Maybe when I get back from holiday in July I'll get some new additions.

What sort of bio-load do they add (I'm guessing it's dependent on snail size), there's a chap on TFF from whom I'm probably homing some unwanted fish. (Total after new inhabitants - 4 guppies, 4 penguin tetra, 4 neon tetra, 2 harlequin rasbora , 2 green rasbora, 3 panda cory's and a pitbull plec. Bit of a harlequin set (pun intended) and over the advised inch per gallon rule but it should be ok since the tank is well filtered (eheim 2213) and has been running for nearly 2 years so is nicely matured.)
 
I had a single Apple Snail (female) and was amazed when I found a clutch of eggs above the waterline at one water change. Its a shame that they never hatched.

As my step into the 'shrimp' world didn't work, I'm thinking of getting some trumpet snails. Something smallish but to do the job as my apple snail was getting rather large.

I did also have some nerites but they arrived in bad condition from a ebay seller and they all died soon after introduction. Although, whilst they were alive, they did a superb job of algae. I didn't even realise there was some on some bogwood and then the next day I saw a proper wood colour for the first time in ages!! Hehe. I did however get some of the eggs laid but they were easy enough to get off.

Anyone got any spare trumpet snails or something similar? Looking for smaller snails to keep things clean.
 
I normally get my inverts from here, very good seller.

snail shop

normally, if your water isnt any good for shrimp, itll be perfect for snails, and visa versa.. high PH will be brill for snails as itll generally be quite hard, which is great for making shells.. low PH will dissolve snail shells, but shrimps will love it. :) so one way or another, you can build a good algae army!

I love nerites, once settled in, extremely hardy and like you say, serious algae munchers
 
Matt Holbrook-Bull said:
normally, if your water isnt any good for shrimp, itll be perfect for snails, and visa versa.. high PH will be brill for snails as itll generally be quite hard, which is great for making shells.. low PH will dissolve snail shells, but shrimps will love it. :) so one way or another, you can build a good algae army!

Not entirely true Matt, as many shrimp varieties actually do better at a slightly higher pH. The problem usually though is that these same varieties are the same onces that are more sensitive to dosing and the like, so when folks put them in their nice planted tank with uber EI dosing or the like, they die. Of course as always it can't possibly be the dosing at fault, so pH gets the blame.

Shrimp however tend not to usually like very high pH. By high I am talking about 7.8 tops. But this is plenty high enough to have both shrimp and snails in the same tank.

Ade
 
Wolfenrook said:
Matt Holbrook-Bull said:
normally, if your water isnt any good for shrimp, itll be perfect for snails, and visa versa.. high PH will be brill for snails as itll generally be quite hard, which is great for making shells.. low PH will dissolve snail shells, but shrimps will love it. :) so one way or another, you can build a good algae army!

Not entirely true Matt, as many shrimp varieties actually do better at a slightly higher pH. The problem usually though is that these same varieties are the same onces that are more sensitive to dosing and the like, so when folks put them in their nice planted tank with uber EI dosing or the like, they die. Of course as always it can't possibly be the dosing at fault, so pH gets the blame.

Shrimp however tend not to usually like very high pH. By high I am talking about 7.8 tops. But this is plenty high enough to have both shrimp and snails in the same tank.

Ade

I was thinking more extremes than that.. out of the tap my water is about 8.2 which they really DONT like :) My point was that if a person was experiencing shrimp death due to PH, then snails would love it.. not that PH was the be all and end all.

Interesting your thoughts on dosing effecting shrimp.. Id be very surprised if it was the dosing on a normal EI schedule effecting them as masses of people run shrimp in heavily dosed tanks very well.. even Mr ADA himself!
 
Superman said:
Anyone got any spare trumpet snails or something similar? Looking for smaller snails to keep things clean.

I've got loads! PM me and I'll give you my address. If you then send me a large sae I will send you some :)

Zoe


PS I love my snails :D As you can probably guess by my avatar >

I've got purple, blue, ivory, pink and yellow - they are so great to watch and their bodies match their shells (i.e. the pink snail has a pale pink body, the powder blue has a dark blue body, the purple has a deep purple body etc...........)

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Thought I'd bring this thread back up rather than start off a new one.

I've had MTS added to my tank in the past but don't really see them that much now, not even on a night.

I'm thinking of adding some more snails to my tank, just wondered if I should add Nerites or more MTS? Not sure if I'd like a "larger" snail like a nerite - wouldn't get a big apple snail again. Would Nerites climb up leaves and bend them down? Just wondered how they cope in planted tanks?
 
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