Another Case of Snails Dying

[steve-s]

I have no idea what the lobster is eating. For all I know he could get hungry and come out and pick at the snails such that they slowly die. Or for that matter, the small hermit crabs could be doing this. Also, my Coral Banded Shrimp is very aggessive and he could be picking at the snails, as well. My son observed him eating one that had fallen and was on his back. However, we have no idea why the snail was on his back since we didn't observe that event. Furthermore, the snail was still alive. Could the Coral Banded Shrimp be the culprit? :?

As I said above, eliminating each possible cause is the best course of action when the cause is not immediately appearant. I am actually not inclined to suspect the lobster (unless larger) or coral banded as they are not known to attack snails. They will not hesitate to take advantage of a free meal if the snail was already done for though.

The hermits could easily attack snails but judging by the size you have said, I think they would be too small unless the snails would be a similar size. I would be more inclined at this point to suspect acclimation, the unknown crabs or possibley some yet unfound predator. You never know, the crabs could turn out to be harmless.

Cheers
Steve

 

[Doan]

Again I cannot emphasize this enough..I AM NO EXPERT these guys are.. However maybe I am just oversimplifying your problem.. Did you get all these snails at the same place at the same time?? Perhaps you don't have the problem at all. Maybe there was something in the water where you got them or their water was bad and they were sick going in.. Maybe you got a bad batch..like they were already poisoned at the store or whatever.. If nothing else in your tank is having a problem maybe it was them and not you.. That being said you should still do the copper test the ph thing and all of the other recommendations that the pros gave you should be tried.. But heck I don't even know if you can poison a snail or how that works.. just a thought..

Doan

 

[awillemd1]

Wonderful dialogue! Thank you both.

I did purchase all of the snails from the same (lfs). Everything else in my aquarium seems to be thriving. I definitely have coralline algae growing as well as a long tentacle anemone (3 weeks - but looks good so far). I have been doing lots of water changes - a 10% and a 20% this month alone, so for the most part I think my water quality is good. Cu tested out at 0 ppm.

My action item list looks like this:

Check pH at different times of the day to validate it is correct.
Take pictures of all livestock in the aquarium and post.
Get a protein skimmer (in progress)
Purchase more snails from a different supplier and make sure I acclimate them properly.

Thanks again for the advice.

awillemd1

 

[awillemd1]

The saga continues! I noticed two days ago a snail just barely haning on to some liverock. Shortly after that he fell off. I righted him and then found him the next day upside down again. Today I thought he was dead, but he appeared to move just slightly.

My latest thought on this is that maybe the snails are starving. Is it possible that they can't access some of the taller hair algae?

I seem to have lots of taller algae and maybe not very much new algae growth.

Thanks in advance for any thoughts.

awillemd1

 

[steve-s]

My latest thought on this is that maybe the snails are starving. Is it possible that they can't access some of the taller hair algae?

More than possible in the absence of lesser algaes. If there are longer macro algaes, they will not always be able to eat them. It will also depend on the species of algae as some are poisonous to fish and mobile inverts. Keeping things manually cropped will help reduce nuisance algaes and make it easier for grazing snails to utilize it.

Not much film alage?

Cheers
Steve

 

[awillemd1]

I don't think I have much film algae at all. I only have to clean off my windows about once a week and even then the film is fairly light compared to what I have seen in the past.

Interestingly, the live rocks at the top of my aquarium are perfectly clean, but the ones that are lower have lots of hair algae. I keep expecting the snails to clean these off, but obviously this isn't going to happen. I need to do as you suggest, i.e. get back in there with my toothbrush.

Thanks again for your help.

awillemd1