Oohitsae
Aquarium Advice Addict
Need some help. I've been waiting on my magenta orange eyed mystery snails to start laying for months now, and 2 days ago they finally started!
I first noticed it when I found one of my smaller guys escaped the tank and was on the floor 5' away. It was alive and in good shape but the next morning had escaped again. I lowered water level to make it a bit harder for it to escape again (yes I'm sure it's the same one as she has a weird scrape on the shell) and woke up to 3 clutches the next morning. Then today I woke up to 4 more. It's insane.
Now as you have already figured, I don't have a hood on the tank and from everything I've been reading it's kind of necessary to have to keep enough moisture on the clutch to keep the eggs from drying out, so I removed them off the tank walls and set them on top of an old breeder net until I figure out what needs to be done.
What should be done? I've read that putting water at the bottom of a container with craft mesh about an inch above it to hold the eggs and then some saran wrap with holes to cover it is a good route, but is there anything more that I need to do for them? I've only recently learned about misting them, so I'm not sure if that's a necessary practice? Would it be okay to just dip the eggs in water every day for a couple seconds? I don't have any spray bottles that haven't had any type of hair product in them on hand so I'd have to run to the store if needed, and in the mean time they would be going without moisture.
Oh, and is 2 weeks pretty average for hatching? Do I need to help them hatch or can/should I just let it happen on it's own? How will I know it's ready? I'm sure I've seen some of the answers to these before, but I can't remember off hand and it'd be great to have it in one place.
Anyways, I'm really hoping atleast a couple of you have some good experience to share. I know that a lot of people aren't a big fan of snails, and I don't blame them, pest snails gave everything a bad name for the most part, but I really enjoy these mysteries!
I first noticed it when I found one of my smaller guys escaped the tank and was on the floor 5' away. It was alive and in good shape but the next morning had escaped again. I lowered water level to make it a bit harder for it to escape again (yes I'm sure it's the same one as she has a weird scrape on the shell) and woke up to 3 clutches the next morning. Then today I woke up to 4 more. It's insane.
Now as you have already figured, I don't have a hood on the tank and from everything I've been reading it's kind of necessary to have to keep enough moisture on the clutch to keep the eggs from drying out, so I removed them off the tank walls and set them on top of an old breeder net until I figure out what needs to be done.
What should be done? I've read that putting water at the bottom of a container with craft mesh about an inch above it to hold the eggs and then some saran wrap with holes to cover it is a good route, but is there anything more that I need to do for them? I've only recently learned about misting them, so I'm not sure if that's a necessary practice? Would it be okay to just dip the eggs in water every day for a couple seconds? I don't have any spray bottles that haven't had any type of hair product in them on hand so I'd have to run to the store if needed, and in the mean time they would be going without moisture.
Oh, and is 2 weeks pretty average for hatching? Do I need to help them hatch or can/should I just let it happen on it's own? How will I know it's ready? I'm sure I've seen some of the answers to these before, but I can't remember off hand and it'd be great to have it in one place.
Anyways, I'm really hoping atleast a couple of you have some good experience to share. I know that a lot of people aren't a big fan of snails, and I don't blame them, pest snails gave everything a bad name for the most part, but I really enjoy these mysteries!