Snails - Friend or Foe?

[Desert Sea]

I have recently being seeing a number of very small snails in my planted tank. They are about 1/8" to 3/16" long. I'm guessing they came in as eggs on one of the plants. I looked around on the net but couldn't find any info on any that looked like them. I'm trying to find out if they are beneficial or a nuisance before I start pulling them out of the tank. Here's a pic of one very magnified. Can anybody shed any light on what kind of snail it is and whether its a pest?

 

[TMaier]

Malaysian Trumpet

Great at cleaning gravel. But can overrun a tank. Pest in my opinion.


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[evil Nick]

pest,
MTS

I tried everything to be rid of them in my tank.

One of my fav LFS's got panama puffers in and I picked up two. Ive seen countless empty MTS shells on top of my gravel and my puffs are nice and fat.

I have 2 pea puffs in my little tank and they decimated the population in there.

 

[Desert Sea]

Thanks for the replies. I guess I will start plucking them out of the tank as they make themselves accessible.

 

[TMaier]

I had to remove my gravel and toss it. Plucking didn't do the trick and none of my stock would eat them.


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[bullyboy]

Loaches will eat em too

 

[IllusionX]

MTS is not that much of a pest. They will not multiply much if they don't have food.

My gold fish tank have a bunch of them, but I no longer see any babies.

While my 50G community have tons of babies, but I also have assassin snails that eat most of the adult MTS.

It's been a month since I took my Betta out of my 2G tank (now empty with just a few plants), and the MTS has almost gone extinct

 

[Desert Sea]

I was able to remove a bunch of them tonight. A somewhat tedious process given how small they are. How big do they get if allowed to mature? The biggest ones I'm seeing are about 1/8".

I thought about maybe getting an assassin snail or two but what would they feed on after the MTS's have been dealt with?

 

[IllusionX]

The best way to remove MTS is to watch out how you feed you fishes. Any food that drops to the substrate will be quickly ate by the MTS. I like to keep them around in my fully planted tank because they will eat dead fishes. Sometimes you just can't see the dead fishes as they get caught under rocks or inside plants.

I have some that grow to 1in long!

 

[evil Nick]

people will say they are caused by overfeeding but if you have a planted tank they will never not have enough food as these things will eat ANYTHING. They will even eat fish waste.
I had loaches and they wouldnt go near them. The only thing that has so far done the trick is the puffers.
Last night the lights went out and I didnt see any on the glass, nor during the dark morning. I know they are still there but maybe the word go out about the 2 jerks eating everyone and they are laying low.

All I know is I have a nice layer of empty shells on my gravel and Im laughing maniacally.

 

[acewiza]

My puffers can't get enough of them. I even saw the big Oscar eating them a few times. I think they are an important part of the food chain and contribute to enviroment stability IF you have residents who eat them in an overall snail-supporting enviroment.

 

[IllusionX]

Yeah, but you can't just put a puffer in a tank with shrimps. Haha

 

[acewiza]

That's kinda what I was implying with the snail-friendly environment support comment. They wil overrun a tank if they are not in the food chain. My feeder tank is always somewhere in the process of snail overrun. I'm just not sure how bad it gets before I harvest a batch for the puffers. That tank always returns the highest nitrate readings, despie being heavily planted.

 

[IllusionX]

That's kinda what I was implying with the snail-friendly environment support comment. They wil overrun a tank if they are not in the food chain. My feeder tank is always somewhere in the process of snail overrun. I'm just not sure how bad it gets before I harvest a batch for the puffers. That tank always returns the highest nitrate readings, despie being heavily planted.

My gold fish tank has a number of large MTS, but definitely not overrun, while my community tank which has a number of assassin snail kept having tons small MTS. So I don't think you need to put them in the food chain..

 

[acewiza]

My gold fish tank has a number of large MTS, but definitely not overrun, while my community tank which has a number of assassin snail kept having tons small MTS. So I don't think you need to put them in the food chain..

Sounds like you are saying the goldfish eat them and the assasins can't eat enough. So they are definitely in your food chains - just not balanced in the assasin environment.

 

[IllusionX]

Sounds like you are saying the goldfish eat them and the assasins can't eat enough. So they are definitely in your food chains - just not balanced in the assasin environment.

I don't have any shells though. They are all alive.