Assassin Snails, Missing Shrimp And Some Mysterious Suprises!

[pablothebetta]

No. 1 - Assassin Snails
I've got a snail issue at the moment and have got some assassin snails recently in an attempt to help get the numbers down. However, I find that they are quite inactive and I've already had two die after just a few weeks of having them. There are tonnes of little tadpole snails in there for them to eat, but they just end up being quite inactive (buried in the sand most of the time) and soon dying. Why might this be happening? I'm pretty sure I don't have any snail-killing chemicals in there.

No. 2 - Shrimp
Two shrimp questions really.
One is that I've had a couple of my cherries dissapearing over the past couple of months. I've lost two or three but have no idea where they have gone. I cannot imagine my betta is the reason, as when he kills things, he just kills them and leaves the bodies there, dead (he did this with a rudolph shrimp the other day ) I haven't seen any bodies, so I don't think he's the cause. Any ideas where they've gone?
Secondly, I've got some young shrimp in my tank I'm over the moon about it, but I just don't know where they've come from. This is sort of linked to my previous question too. I bought 3 cherries to add to my other a few months ago and I noticed one was berried. However after adding it into the tank, I haven't seen it and this was a few months ago. If this female has dissapeared along with her eggs, where have these young shrimp come from? They've been in there a while and are probably just over 1cm long now - they just haven't got their colour yet. I've found about three which I know isn't too impressive, but I'm still very happy about them (and whatsmore, my betta doesn't seem to have found them - that or he just isn't bothered).

If anyone has managed to get to this point of this little miniature essay, is anyone able to advise me on the above? Why do my assassins keep dying on me? Where might my shrimp have gone? If the female shrimp dissapeared, how come I have young ones in there?

Many thanks

 

[Nosphaer]

No. 1 - Assassin Snails
I've got a snail issue at the moment and have got some assassin snails recently in an attempt to help get the numbers down. However, I find that they are quite inactive and I've already had two die after just a few weeks of having them. There are tonnes of little tadpole snails in there for them to eat, but they just end up being quite inactive (buried in the sand most of the time) and soon dying. Why might this be happening? I'm pretty sure I don't have any snail-killing chemicals in there.

No. 2 - Shrimp
Two shrimp questions really.
One is that I've had a couple of my cherries dissapearing over the past couple of months. I've lost two or three but have no idea where they have gone. I cannot imagine my betta is the reason, as when he kills things, he just kills them and leaves the bodies there, dead (he did this with a rudolph shrimp the other day ) I haven't seen any bodies, so I don't think he's the cause. Any ideas where they've gone?
Secondly, I've got some young shrimp in my tank I'm over the moon about it, but I just don't know where they've come from. This is sort of linked to my previous question too. I bought 3 cherries to add to my other a few months ago and I noticed one was berried. However after adding it into the tank, I haven't seen it and this was a few months ago. If this female has dissapeared along with her eggs, where have these young shrimp come from? They've been in there a while and are probably just over 1cm long now - they just haven't got their colour yet. I've found about three which I know isn't too impressive, but I'm still very happy about them (and whatsmore, my betta doesn't seem to have found them - that or he just isn't bothered).

If anyone has managed to get to this point of this little miniature essay, is anyone able to advise me on the above? Why do my assassins keep dying on me? Where might my shrimp have gone? If the female shrimp dissapeared, how come I have young ones in there?

Many thanks

Unless you put the snails into unimaginable pH shock or had harsh medications in the tank, I can't imagine why they perished, though I must mention that it is known normal behavior for them to burrow into the substrate and await a victim snail. Aside from this, I'm not a good source on assassins.

As for the shrimp disappearances, it may be a simpler reason than you think...

I imagine that you have been fasting your fish to try to control the snail population. Well, if your betta did kill any shrimp, there's a good chance that snails within your tank would have rushed to them for a quick, much wanted meal. This, however, is only a possibility.

I hope your invertebrate dilemmas will come to a happy end, though :c

 

[Juggler75]

1. Assassins are quite inactive most of the time, lieing in wait for their prey then chasing them down. If the snails are small they may not set off their chase instinct - Someone told me they need to be able to fit their appendage inside the prey snails opening to actually eat it. therefore I always think baby assasins for little snails and adults for the pond snails/bladder snails/adult mts snails. If there is no suitable food then they will scavenge and love bloodworms! Maybe yours were ill/old or died of starvation. If you manage to get them to breed then I found the various sizes decimated the 'pest' snails over time. (Bear in mind each assassin may only eat a max of 2-3 snails of the correct size per day)

2.Your berried female probably found a nice hidey hole and gave birth. I very rarely find shrimp bodies from deaths as other tankmates are quick to devour the bodies (especially assassins and other shrimp). Keep in mind that if they have enough cover then for everyone you can see there'll be another 2 you can't. Anything that can fit the shrimplets into their mouths will so they do tend to hide until they are a decent size and every generation in my tank seems to be better than the previous at hide and seek.

 

[pablothebetta]

Thankyou both for your replies. My tank isnt very big at 28L, so if there were dead bodies its likely that I'd have seen them though, its ever so strange. Still, I do know what you mean about them hiding, they can be very good at it.- I have a load of echinodoras plants in there that they could hide in, only surely I'd have seen them by now if they went into those - those who have dissapeared have been gone for weeks and months now. can't imagine they've jumped out either as there is a lid on the tank apart from during w/cs.

I didn't realise it was natural for assassins to be so lazy - is it normal for them to lay in the same place for a few days? This is how my others died - they simply stayed in the same place until I wondered if they'd passed away which they had. Any way to avoid this? Using what was said about them waiting for prey, it seems they simply wait for it to come to them in the sand rather than looking for it - unlike when they arrive firstly and are active hunters for a few days until they decide to bury themselves. There's a large range of sizes of snails to be honest - there's a range of sizes, from tiny ones to ones that are reasonably large. Is this normal behaviour, even if it seems that the assassin would find food if they got up and looked for it?

Thanks again for all the input

 

[Juggler75]

yeah, assasins seem to gorge themselves then seem content to 'bed down' and digest their meals before some snail wakes them up again and they go off hunting or scavenging. I've never seen one just bed down and die, I'd expect they'd try to scavenge a bit before they died of starvation so maybe they were ill.

You'd be suprised at just how well cherries hide. I thought I had about 80 in the tank till I emptied it today of most decor to try and catch a stray endler female (lesson learned the hard way that having females in the tank leads to decimation of shrimp populations and lots of endler fry) I stopped counting at 100 in one half of the substrate, and thats before the nooks and crannies of the bogwood/slate etc or any strays that were hiding in the masses of moss attached to the decor that was pulled out and put in a bucket during the capture.

 

[pablothebetta]

yeah, assasins seem to gorge themselves then seem content to 'bed down' and digest their meals before some snail wakes them up again and they go off hunting or scavenging. I've never seen one just bed down and die, I'd expect they'd try to scavenge a bit before they died of starvation so maybe they were ill.

You'd be suprised at just how well cherries hide. I thought I had about 80 in the tank till I emptied it today of most decor to try and catch a stray endler female (lesson learned the hard way that having females in the tank leads to decimation of shrimp populations and lots of endler fry) I stopped counting at 100 in one half of the substrate, and thats before the nooks and crannies of the bogwood/slate etc or any strays that were hiding in the masses of moss attached to the decor that was pulled out and put in a bucket during the capture.

The snail hasn't moved for at least 4-5 days now - this is just what the others did before they died. Should I move him to try to get him to wake up? I've noticed they've changed positions a few times, I'm guessing this is a good sign?

I have only ever had a maximum of 4 cherries when I first bought them some time ago, I really cannot find them. I've only seen one these past few days. I can't think where these shrimp might have been hiding for a few weeks/months. I have quite dense planting in my tank, but I'm sure I would have found them by now.

Thanks for the replies.