Snail control

[DocOc]

I have a small planted tank with too many snails. I don't want to add anything like a loach because the tank is at capacity and the old cucumber-bait trick works OK, but not great. I'm hoping for a change that will make the environment inhospitable to their proliferation.
I don't mind them, I just have too many.

 

[onah]

stop feeding so much, that should help a bit. what else do u have in the tank?

 

[JustOneMore20]

I agree. If they are reproducing alot, then that probably means you are overfeeding. If you limit the number of times you feed a day and/or limit the amount, then the numbers should get lower or stabilize. More food=more snails.

 

[cabezon]

I just got a yo-yo loach today. I only had 3 tetras and a guppy. well, 9 ghost shrimp and 100 snails.

 

[DocOc]

I have yo-yos in my other tank. They can put away the snails!

There are Guppies, Endler's, and Cories in this little 6 gallon. We recently stopped using flake because of the small size of these guys. Only small granulated pellets. The cories root around for them and the others grab them out of the water column.

Does anyone think that a shrimp or two would scavenge better than the snails and out-compete them?

 

[joannde]

Personally I think your best bet is to just capture the snails. Get a nice dark green piece of romaine lettuce and leave it out of the fridge until it wilts a little, or nuke it for 5 seconds. Then put it in the tank. In the morning it will be covered in snails - just net the whole thing out. Repeat a couple of times and you'll have the population in control. A couple of ghost shrimp may help also, but since you already have the snails in there you should remove as many as possible anyway (and don't forget about those hatching eggs - you'll need to keep up the "catching" for awhile)

 

[squawkbert]

I was going to say
1) romane lettuce>zucch
2) yes, shrimp >snails for food

 

[cabezon]

One week later, and most of the snails are gone. I never saw the yo-yo eat one, but there are only a few left. I still see some eggs, so the yo yo will still have some food.

I may have to use the one gallon fishbowl I have for brine shrimp and snails.

 

[happygirl65]

What does everyone do with the snails you net out? Do you freeze them or just throw them out?

 

[joannde]

I feed mine to my drawf puffers LOL

before getting the puffers I either left the snails out of water in a cup I had near the tank or froze them first. I wouldn't discard them alive as its possible they might become an environmental pest outside of aquariums.

 

[Jman17H]

Depending on what type of snails you have a lot of people with planted tanks love ramshorns and mts. In my opinion ramshorns are prefered but they do not last long with loaches while mts are indestructable and with a food source will just keep multipling since there shells are too hard for most fish to crush.

You could probably post them on the classified forum and get someone to take them off your hands and make a few bucks.

 

[ataylor]

I'm not sure about yo-yos but my clown loaches love to eat snails. Occasionally I'll catch a snail or two in my planted tank and drop them in my clown loach tank. The snail will usually be sucked clean out of the shell before it even hits the substrate. Those clowns love a little escargot.

 

[SparKy697]

What does everyone do with the snails you net out? Do you freeze them or just throw them out?

Please don't throw them out. The story I read most is one of claims that these snails that are discarded or flushed are somehow surviving, although I can't imagine how. Some species are said to be causing many problems within local waters.

Any tank could benefit from a group of loaches, they are fun to watch and are more than happy to keep your snails under control.

 

[mitche8359]

One week later, and most of the snails are gone. I never saw the yo-yo eat one, but there are only a few left. I still see some eggs, so the yo yo will still have some food.

I may have to use the one gallon fishbowl I have for brine shrimp and snails.

We litterally had thousands of snails in our 55 gallon. Three yo-yos cleaned them out in about 4 days. We never saw them eat a snail either, but hey. That was two years ago at least. They are still with us, eating flake food. I just had to do a tear down of the tank and though we lost two. The wife said she saw all three a couple weeks ago. Yeah right. So I got the one remaining yo-yo out of the tank with the others. Wife convinced me so I looked in the plants I took out and sure enough found one of the yo-yos in the bucket. The other was no where to be found. Had all the water out of the tank and was flushing it with ice cold tap water. Ten minutes later the third yo-yo comes out from the gravel it was hiding under, and we SEARCHED the gravel. Thankfully he did ok and is happy back in the cleaned tank.