Snail question...

[capewind]

Is there anything bad to know about snails?

I know some keep/buy snails for their ponds... I never have, just havent done it... think the popular choice is trap door snails??? I had looked them up awhile back, but just havent gotten around to adding any... My questions relate to "other" snails... have some... either they fell from the sky, or we brought them in with plants... Once in awhile (moving water hyacinths), I'd find a couple, but never gave them any thoughts... fast forward...

It's been 2-3 weeks since we caught the last batch of babies... I never saw any snails in the fish tank before (no decor but one plastic plant that was washed off and a handful of crush coral). While the tank had been running a good month without fish, from removing the last batch of fish, I chose to change out about 75% of the water in the tank (30 gallons) with fresh pond water, before putting the new tiny guys in it... I also added one water hyacinth for the babies to hide in...

Within a day or two, I spotted a couple of tiny snails cruising along the glass... didnt think much of it... now daily, I am finding more and more. I didnt exactly wash/sterilize the water hyacinth, but did slosh the roots pretty well (hoping to knock off any nympths)... I am betting I brought the snails in on the plant... as the water went into the tank, by measuring cups LOL, it was filtered with a small net (my being paranoid of nympths)... So now this morning, I can easily find 13 little snails... I am dounting that even being so small, that so many managed to hang on to the plant, so suspect they are breeding...

The "big ones" could probably sit 6-8 of them on the surface of a dime, they are small... the tiny ones, well, they are tiny LOL. I cant find the ruler, I would say they are smaller than "one line"... cant remember if that is 1/16th or 1/32nd LMAO... I would call the tiny shells near clear in color, with a hint of dark speckles... the big ones are brownish black with some minor lighter speckles...

Any clue what kind they are, and most importantly, could they be harmful to the baby fish? The smallest of the babies are about 1/3" now, and the bigguns, are about 3/4".... If need be, I can pull a couple out of the tank to take a picture... The body of the little creatures look almost cream in color (maybe a hint of baby pink, but more creamy) and their little antlers look fleshy,,,

 

[addy1]

I put trap doors into the shubbie house tank. I can see the paths they eat though the algae that likes to grow on the sides. I don't worry about snails.
Added trap doors, others have just arrived! lol prob with plants.

 

[capewind]

As long as these little guys are not harmful to babies, they are welcome to clean the glass all they want. I just didnt know if they were a safe species .. would like to figure out what kind they are tho ... I just dont think this many could have hidden in the plant, so wondering if they are breeding... and if they are, and are a safe species, have some green algae growing on the bottom of the kiddie pool that I can move some snails over to eat (that same flat stuff that ya get on the glass of a fishtank). I'm all for helpful/do no harm, stow-a-ways...

 

[addy1]

The trap doors do live birth, other snails do eggs, you probably brought in some eggs on the plant, they are nicely hatching for you. The trap doors in the tank have been doing the breeding moves, I will probably have baby ones in the near future.

I have not read about any snail harming a fish, that I can recall.

 

[capewind]

hmmm... havent identified the species yet, but one site said it takes 4 weeks for the eggs to hatch... since the plant has only been inside for 2-3 weeks, it must have had a bunch of eggs on it... which makes me wonder about the plant pond in the basement... guessing to have brought a total of 70-80 water hyacinths in, plus misc potted plants LOL... escargo anyone??? LOL.

 

[Fishylove]

Lmao! cape your so funny. I don't think snails in general are harmful to baby fish, other than eating the algae that the babies could be eating. But sense you're feeding them I'm sure, so even that wouldn't be anything to worry about. Pond snails Will eat pond plants though, but normally prefer to eat the decaying folage and in the aquarium environment there's not a lot of that, so they'll eat the healthy plants. But you said that you don't have any plants other than the hyacinth so no worries there. So really the only thing you have to worry about is how fast they multiply ( which they do prolifically lol ) and btw give birth to live young. So keep them in check and you'll be fine

 

[Fishylove]

Once your babies get bigger, you can put a larger koi in the tank to eat the snails to keep them in check. Till then here's a trick- Take a lettuce leaf and rinse both sides with hot water, then anchor it to the bottom of the tank ( now if you need to speed this up, use more than one leaf) the next morning, before you turn on the light, remove the leaf and all of the snails on it. Good way to romove tons of snails at once.

 

[Fishylove]

Oh!! And I forgot, if you soak those hyacinths in a saltwater bath for ten minutes, it will kill the snails

 

[sissy]

Trapdoor snails do give birth and my koi love to eat them so not really worth the money .Trapdoor snails are better for ponds as they clean but remember there would have to be thousands of snails to see what they do .They can also withstand cold and can not live out of water like some snails can

this just a snail that found my pond and they just appear




these are the trapdoor snails i got that aggie and bert ate .Just sucked them right out of there shells .I put them in a fish tank first

 

[capewind]

Oh boy... I wish I read more before I cleaned the filters on the fish tank and kiddie pool... they are in BOTH areas... in the kiddie pool, I must have found 20+ just on the little plastic thing that holds the filter media... and got a bunch out of the little sponge (several poor souls just went down the kitchen drain).. so the babies and or eggs must have come in with the tote of water, which I pathetically strained through a 3" white/fine mesh fishtank net (did a water change early on with other babies and ended up with nympths chowing away on my sweet finned babies...) Anyways... I took a couple of pics LOL. The first few I found I tossed in a dish with a penny... what remained in the bowl of water after rinsing out the sponge filter are a few more (counted 14 from the bowl alone) ... silly me tossed them all back into the kiddie pool... I guess there be snails inside LOL. If I had read more, they would have gone OUTSIDE....

 

[Craig58]

Snails won't hurt fish. Natural addition to any pond. If they get out of control in the indoor tank you can simply crush the shell when they are small between your finger and the glass. The fish will eat up any debris. But really, the more the merrier unless you are maintaining a tropical display tank.

Craig

 

[capewind]

I dont care if they are outside, as if a snail was so capable to catch a baby out there, they earned it... when I spotted a couple little snails, I didnt think they could do much, but then seeing so many was wondering if there was such a thing as a harmful snail... or atleast harmful to a baby... a bit paranoid for the babies we bring in after the little disaster of just casually dumping pond water into the baby areas and ended up with a lot of chewed up babies... dragongly nympths look awesome in the pond, but when you can see them inside with a baby, they are rather creepy looking vultures LOL.

 

[sissy]

I have never had a problem andthink the snails are more at risk of being eaten than the other way around . :razz:

 

[capewind]

At this point, I figured with as much as I am over feeding, they can be helpful;-)

 

[sissy]

Not sure I have any of the trapdoor snails i bought left but could have some babies maybe .But trapdoor snails are not cheap .