unwelcome visitors

[CaptnIgnit]

Sounds like pond snails, if you can get a straight on picture I can say for sure.

[GlitcH]

I bought what my lfs called a mystery snail before...............and it ate my plants.

My pond snails don't touch my plants. They just keep everything spotless.
umm.......nearly spotless.

I'd have them on my 92G if my dwarf puffer would cooperate.

[shayfish]

Well that particular one won't be providing us with any more pictures.

There are holes in my plants.

[Burks]

Toss in a few pieces of zucchini and just net it out a few hours later. When I put a piece in my tank for my shrimp it is completely covered in about 10 minutes with snails.

[hc8719]

Originally Posted by toddnbecka

If you really want to eliminate them, do it before you stock anything else. I used Had-a-Snail, a copper sulfate solution, to clean out a hydra infestation in my cherry shrimp tank.

hydra infestation? they dont multiply that fast do they?

do fish eat them, i know they have those little stingers?

[Blazeherd2306]

The "leaving a piece of lettuce in the tank overnight and removing it the next day" ought to do it. Cheaper than pesticides.

[Tostada]

Do all snails except mystery/apple snails reproduce asexually? I mean, I know mystery snails have a gender, but do other snails still need two to reproduce?

I just randomly found a ramshorn in one of my tanks, which actually seems kinda cool. I'm starting to get some kind of plant snails in my other tank, though, which kinda sucks.

I think clown loaches are great, but I wouldn't be able to keep one very long in my 30 gal. Is there anything that would fit in a 30 gal, eat plant snails, but not kill all my MTS?

[GlitcH]

I've got yoyos and mts living together. The yoyos will eat the mts if they can find them and they occasionally do find them.......but I am always seeing more baby mts. I am not sure but I don't think that the yoyos will ever get the upper hand on the mts.

[MyCatsDrool]

Wow. and I pay good money to put snails in my tanks.

[toddnbecka]

Most snails are hermaphrodites (both m/f sex organs) and will lay eggs, but they still need 2 to reproduce. However, only having one snail is no guarantee, unless it has been the only snail in the tank since it hatched, because any given snail may already be fertile before being placed in a new tank.

[hc8719]

Originally Posted by toddnbecka

Most snails are hermaphrodites (both m/f sex organs) and will lay eggs, but they still need 2 to reproduce. However, only having one snail is no guarantee, unless it has been the only snail in the tank since it hatched, because any given snail may already be fertile before being placed in a new tank.

i thought, despite being hermaphrodites, some snails, if not most, can reproduce asexually, i know some geckos can

[toddnbecka]

I'm not sure, try raising a single ramshorn from a tiny baby and see if it reproduces?

[Mosaic]

I have a tank with just one ramshorn (and no fish. so nothing could be eating the eggs/babies). I raised it and tranferred it to where it is now probably about 3-4 months ago. There have been no baby ramshorns. Actually, I've kept one ramshorn in a tank several times to prevent reproduction, and it's never backfired. Not that it's proof they can't reproduce asexually, but if they do, they aren't nearly as eager to do it that way as the old fashion way.

[Tostada]

How big do ramshorns get? They've always been pretty tiny (maybe 0.5") when I saw them.

[Mosaic]

There is a giant species, but they don't hitchhike; you buy them like mystery snails (which is good, because these guys really do mow through plants). I'd say mine is 2" right now.
My biggest "pest" ramshorns get to 1", and I have one each of two different species that have gotten this big. One's dead, but the other's still growing, albeit more slowly now. It seems a bit harder to grow them out once they get past .5", but that might be because I generally keep them all in one breeding tank and they just have a harder time getting their food that way.

[hc8719]

the big ramshorn, like baseball sized are the marsala i believe (not sure on spelling)