behaviour of auger snails

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merlin777

Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Joined
Apr 16, 2013
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I was given a few baby auger snails for my baby biorb a couple of years ago. I know they have multiplied because sometimes, usually at night, up to a dozen appear at once sometimes quite a few more.

During the day I guess they hide in the substrate but its tricky to see any of them.

Tonight, it looks like every single one of them, from babies to those up to an inch long, have all come out at once. I'd estimate at least a 100 of them.

My biorb is cold/fresh and they share with a chinese golden algae eater quite happily. I feed with algae wafers. I'm not sure if it's the fish, snails or both that keep the algae down but I don't have an algae problem at the moment!

What I wanted to know is, why have they all come out at once? I'm in the UK, the room they are in has the heating thermostat right next to their tank and it's a fairly constant 19 degrees +/- a degree so I can't think of any environmental changes that might have caused it. They don't just come out in the dark and disappear when the lights come on,

What's occurring!
 
Check the temp and the water quality or O2. Dead big snail or a fish perhaps?

They usually do this when there is a water quality issue. They do not lie, something is up. Usually it is a water quality issue. And it is urgent or they wouldn't be coming up.

Do a couple of pwc and see them go back down to the lower areas. You can also remove a bunch if you can get ahold of them keep them in a vase or small tank maybe someone would like them for pets or food. They poop quite a bit
 
The room temp is a constant 19 to 20 c.
No dead fish but although I can't see them there must surely be some dead snails with this population over a couple of years so I'll do some pwcs but I don't understand why the sudden appearance en-mass.

I quite like having all these snails and I might even add some other types and have a snail tank. The auger snails are a wee bit boring on their own.
 
Red Ramshorn snails are really fun to watch and very colorful - see my signature pic!

So would these Auger snails be the same /similar to Malaysian Trumpet Snails aka MTS? There are different patterns on the shells and colors as well.

Orange or Yellow Dwarf Rabbit or Poso snails are really adorable but some say might eat some links of plants.
 
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I tried to send you a photo but the insert photo button asks me for a url and my photos are on my pc, not online. If I can work out how to post an image you might be able to ID them.
 
Aha - i think I've cracked it. Some photos of the snails in question are attached hopefully.

They have pretty much all disappeared now but they had been pairing off so i wondered if they had come up to mate?
 

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Did you do a pwc?

I think they probably do the mating wherever they want, and I have had innumerable amounts of babies over the years with out any traveling up the glass.

Mine will wander around in the moss or in some plants eating up tiny particles of food after feeding.

There have been many times I have kept snail bowls or added a few shrimp in too, fun!

This is a fun thread with lots of info and ideas! Take a look if you are still considering something like that.
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f24/planted-bowls-256693.html
 
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Thanks Autumnsky. Did you see the pix? Are they definitely auger snails?
 
The article says they won't muscle shrimp off food but I have seen them swarm food pieces on the gravel so don't believe that at all
 
Well, I did a 50% pwc and some of the larger snails have disappeared but many of the smaller ones have now gone up to the water line.
 
How is your aeration?

I would try another 50% water change when you can get to it and check the water parameters again.

It seems something is wrong.

Any sprayed things in the house, like room srray, bug or pest, or lysol or cleaner, or paint or perfume/cologne...???

Anything that occured the days before, or the day that you started noticing it?

Maybe a gentle rinse with dechlorinated water of the substrate through a strainer or something, if you can't get them a bit happier.
 
I've done a 2nd 50% change so we'll see how that goes.
Nothing sprayed. The only new thing is a reed diffuser near the tank which I can barely smell and pre-dates the snail exodus by a month.
Aeration should be OK. It's a biorb and there's a healthy column of bubbles in the central tube.
 
I think I've mostly solved the mystery.

I think the snails all surfaced because the water was manky. I can't account for why they all came up at the same time as there were no sudden environmental changes and they did seem to be mating as well.

After 2 50% pwc's, their behaviour changed and most of them (apart from the biggest) came up to the water line. I noticed that I hadn't put quite enough water in to cover the top of the bubble tube so although the bubble flow was good I don't think they were breaking in sufficient surface area to fully aerate the water. I put a few more cm of water in to cover the top of the bubble tube and overnight all the snails disappeared again!
 
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