Help! Tiger Nerite Shell Cracked!

[SnailorJ]

I just got two new zebra nerite snails and one tiger nerite snail yesterday. All of the zebra nerites in the store were at the top of the glass in their tank, and many of the zebras were dead. The one I got was under a rock. I figured it was a water quality issue and that they would be rehabilitated in my tank. Plenty of algae for them and good water quality. My zebras are zooming around, but my tiger hardly moves. He moves extremely slowly and even when he's moving I can hardly see his body because it doesn't really stick out of the shell. I noticed a little crack lengthwise a milimeter above his shell opening about 1/4 of the way across. Today I noticed it got longer! Is there anything I can do??? Will it heal on its own or is he going to die? Is this why he's hardly moving and not coming out of his shell when he does move? I need some help

 

[Fishfur]

It depends on whether he has internal damage under the shell. It's possible to patch snail shells, but you need a bit of snail shell to do it with. Use crazy glue, but be dead careful no glue touches the snail's body.

He may have been dropped or had something dropped on him, and in that case, he may have internal damage. I'd be tempted to return it to the store and complain.. he was in that state when he was sold.. but if you can't or don't want to, about all you can do is make sure he has food where he can get it without working for it and very clean water that's hard and alkaline, to have a chance to recover.

Snails are able to heal cracks, but it takes a fair bit of time. They deposit calcium into the crack. Make sure he has a diet high in calcium. A vacation feeder block with spirulina in it may help. Or make a snail diet, there are recipes here if you search. Snail 0.. or snail jello. Uses agar or gelatine to bind the ingredients, and you can add a bit of extra calcium to that.. grind up a calcium pill or buy powdered calcium from the health food store, or grind clean eggs shells to powder and use that.

Best of luck.. hope he does get better. I'm very fond of nerites.