Spider web????

[Iceman72]

Please help. I'm about to give up. Last night I emptied all my water put in salt and I come home and it looks like there are spider webs in my tank. Do I need to replace the sand?

 

[Mebbid]

Is your rock established live rock? That looks a lot like the mucus nets from vermetid snails. I never really see the nets in my tank unless I stir up my sandbed a little.

 

[Iceman72]

The rock is established. Do you think a dead turbo caused it? Should I get out all my sand, scrub down again and redo again?

 

[Jcj0033]

Vermitid snail for sure

 

[Iceman72]

These darn snails. No more for me. So how do I get rid of it? Should I get new sand? And redo?

 

[Mebbid]

These darn snails. No more for me. So how do I get rid of it? Should I get new sand? And redo?

They don't have anything to do with turbo snails. They are a harmless hitch hiker that filter feeds with the "spider webs" that you're seeing. The only reason they look bad is the particulate matter that's floating around your tank has collected on their nets.

 

[Gregcoyote]

I'm not sure you can get rid of all of them. Seems my wrasses keep the population down for me.

 

[Jerinanyon]

Ahh you have been infested with Vermited snails. Once you have one, you have hundreds. And you can't do anything but get a new tank going with all new rocks. Or chisel them off a rock. Or do what happened to me and let an electric current into your water (on accident). It killed all of mine and my ich. And my cyano. And my corals. Good luck

 

[Sniperhank]

Vermetid snails can be managed. Wrasses find them a tasty treat, but I do t want to advocate adding livestock to solve a problem. But starting over it's needed. You can easily find the shell the snails are building and smash it. When I battled mine, I even jammed a needle down the tube for good measure.

 

[bribo12]

I have plenty in my tank and I in no way find them inhibitory towards my corals growth. If you wanna kill them that's fine but I will argue to the day I die that they aren't a big deal.

 

[Sniperhank]

I have plenty in my tank and I in no way find them inhibitory towards my corals growth. If you wanna kill them that's fine but I will argue to the day I die that they aren't a big deal.

As we've had both sides of this topic before, I do suggest some additional reading besides people like me stating their losses from them. This is a reef builders article about it. Vermetid snails are bad for stony corals, coral crabs keep em in check