Snails

[Johnny Tuttle]

I've tried finding some IDs now for my three hitchhiker species of snails in my tank now, but I'm having little luck.

Someone prepared a guide to FW algae, and that was stellar. Do we have an equivalent for snails? Any of us with planted tanks would need it

 

[Purrbox]

Most hitchhiker snails are going to be either pond snails, malaysain trumpet snails, or small ramshorn snails. Do a search on google images and you should be able to get lots of pictures of each variety to compare to.

 

[Jnam]

this is a good article with pictures of most snails.

Aquamaniacs :: View topic - What is this snail? Will it eat my plants?

 

[mgamer20o0]

Snails - how to recognize them

thats a great link to most fw snail.... put like purrbox said most likely pond mts or ramshorn

 

[Johnny Tuttle]

Those were great links. I've got small and giant ramshorns, and I can't decide yet if my third hitchhiking species are mysteries, pond snails, or possibly even a few offspring from my apple.

 

[mgamer20o0]

apples are easy to tell they lay their eggs above the water line. its hard to miss them.

 

[Johnny Tuttle]

And I didn't see that. These ones have the spirals and shell shape of apples, but they look less like apples now that they are no longer white but brown.

I'll try to post some pictures. I'm enjoying how robust my snail population is--all the more interest in the tank, but I might have to start taking some steps to protect my plants.

 

[Johnny Tuttle]

I should point out that I'd love to get some MTSs. They sound very cool, and they are on my wish list for sure.

In baiting my snails to come out for me to ID them (turning the tank light out then coming back a while later), I saw one of my amano shrimp for the first time in a week!

 

[Purrbox]

By giant ramshorn, do you mean columbian ramshorn? Do they have gold and brown stripes? If so you'll want them out of the aquarium asap before they decimate your live plants.

 

[Johnny Tuttle]

Thankfully no....this look like the brown ones described as the bigger ramshorns. These ones are brownish for sure.

The ones that had looked liked apples are now mostly grey--these are the ones I can't or haven't ID'd yet. They look like mini-apple snails, except they are greyish/brown now. I have 10+ of these.

 

[Purrbox]

I just checked out the link. Looks like you were referring to the ones labelled as Great Ramshorn Snails. Most of us refer to both those and the ones directly above as small ramshorn snails since they generally don't get much larger than 1" and are significantly smaller than the Columbian Ramshorn.

I'm betting the mostly grey ones that you haven't positively ID'd yet are probably Pond Snails from your description. The elongated/pointiness of their shells is more pronounced when they get larger.

 

[Johnny Tuttle]

I'm thinking that's likely the case. They likely just look squat now--they will get that football shape as they age.

I might remove all but a couple of those--I remember your saying you don't mind a ramshorn or few in your planted tanks, but I can't imagine you let too many pond snails mature. Admittedly, they are largely sticking to the algae on my tank walls so far.

 

[Jnam]

Ok this is what works for me, pond snails LOVE Echidna Lettuce, forgive the spelling, its the really bitter kinda wirery lettuce. Put it in the tank right after the lights go out, then in about 2 hours fish out the lettuce and it will be covered in pond snails, for whatever reason the ramshorn snails stay away from it. Works for me.

 

[Johnny Tuttle]

Thanks.

I removed a fair few manually yesterday during a 50-60% PWC, but of course, my front glass had plenty when I turned the lights on this morning. I'll keep going on the manual removal for now.