Assassin Snails Sticking Together For Days At A Time

[crmpicco]

I have three assassin snails in my tank and over the past three to four weeks I have noticed that two of them seem to stick to each other almost all of the time. One of the two that are always joined seems to have a strange "head", if you like, in the way that it looks a bit crusty rather than the normal slimy appearence they have.
 
I seperated the two snails earlier this evening to see if they end up working their way back together, but so far they are seperate and that was about 1 1/2 hrs ago.
 
I'm curious though, why would the snails do this? I must admit, they are inactive snails now that they have cleared out all the ramshorn and pest snails from the tank. So it's almost like they've got nothing to do all day, so they either sleep dormant or stick to each other.
 
I still have my baby assassin snail in my hatchery tank with my guppy and platy fry, although it's not growing much. So I wonder if breeding would cause this strange behaviour i'm seeing?

 

[TwoTankAmin]

Sex most likely. Baby assassins like to bury in the substrate for a couple of months to grow in safety. So often we don't see the babies for some time.

 

[crmpicco]

Sex most likely. Baby assassins like to bury in the substrate for a couple of months to grow in safety. So often we don't see the babies for some time.

 
That's interesting. When I looked up Google Images for "assassin snails breeding", I came across this picture which is how the snails look a lot of the time recently. To date, I have only ever seen one baby assassin snail in my tank and I swiftly put it in the hatchery tank with my fry. But I suppose, as you say there could be much more. They're not causing any problems for me so i'm quite happy to leave them as they are.
 
Although I have a community tank I seem to have done a decent job so far of breeding as I have Guppy and Platy fry along with with baby Assassin Snails I think i'll have a go at Mollies next.
 

 

[This Old Spouse]

Yep, they're in love ... 

 
You don't need to separate out the babies when you see them, because by the time you see them they're well established. Unless you need snail control in your fry tank?