Breeding Nerite Snails

[dizzied]

I've heard claims of people breeding nerites in freshwater. Those were Olive nerites though.

 

[three-fingers]

I would have thought that nerite eggs probably would hatch in freshwater so long as the conditions were good enough (I guess comparable to where they come from in nature), but that the larvae from the eggs wouldn't be able to live long enough in freshwater to develop into snails?

 

[Marine/Freshwater?]

Really for brackish a hydrometer is the most important tool. Can't keep brackish fish without it. You should just pick one up any way even if your Nerites do'n breed. Mine have never bred. Mine are saltwater ones I collected locally and I keep them at 1.016.

 

[poopsydrew]

Hey Esfa. I doubt the nerite eggs hatched.
The breeding cycle for nerite snails is very complex and requires 100% brackish water.

Really... and what sg exactly is 100 percent brackish water? 1.001? 1.010? 1.018?

I dont understand at all what you mean by "100 percent" brackish water, that doesnt make much sense.

Why dont you explain more about the breeding cycle and inform Esfa and the rest of us please since it seems you have knowledge on the subject. Im interested.

Drew

 

[RadaR]

Hey Esfa. I doubt the nerite eggs hatched.
The breeding cycle for nerite snails is very complex and requires 100% brackish water.

Really... and what sg exactly is 100 percent brackish water? 1.001? 1.010? 1.018?

I dont understand at all what you mean by "100 percent" brackish water, that doesnt make much sense.

Why dont you explain more about the breeding cycle and inform Esfa and the rest of us please since it seems you have knowledge on the subject. Im interested.

Drew

Ok fine. 100% isn't that good an explanation. I was basically trying to say it has to be brackish water, and not freshwater with just a table spoon of salt like what people would do to get rid of ich.
My knowledge of the cycle isn't very much. All i know, is that it's very complex. I'll try and get a mate to come on and post exactly why it's complex.

 

[severum boy]

Hey Esfa. I doubt the nerite eggs hatched.
The breeding cycle for nerite snails is very complex and requires 100% brackish water.

Really... and what sg exactly is 100 percent brackish water? 1.001? 1.010? 1.018?

I dont understand at all what you mean by "100 percent" brackish water, that doesnt make much sense.

Why dont you explain more about the breeding cycle and inform Esfa and the rest of us please since it seems you have knowledge on the subject. Im interested.

Drew

Fred, understandably because its not a subject that most aquarists really care about, doesent know about the breeding cycle of Nerites. He was just trying to help Esfa by using the knowledge that he has gathered (Nerites = Dont breed in freshwater). To me at least, someone who doesent know about the Nerite breeding cycle wont say that they know about it, Fred has said nothing to suggest that he knows about it. If Fred knew, he would have said. End Of.

As for the breeding cycle, seeing as its important to say something about it before someone gets upset; it is hard to say for sure exactly what it is because many different species (freshwater, brackish and marine) are sold for aquaria. For now, I will try to deal with Neritina species, the most common freshwater species sold for aquaria. Yes, they are freshwater adult snails, but they are Amphidromous and have marine based larvae that migrate up into streams following a period of organic dispercal (a large flood for instance) where the eggs are washed down with the flood, or the newly hatched larvae are caught in the flow from the river and are swiftly transported into the sea. Once they have grown for a few months, the larvae make their way up a number of different streams to get back to freshwater. To do this succesfully, they need to be able to withstand huge differences in salinity. They could enter a very fast flowing, small stream in which case they would need to change very quickly back to freshwater from marine; or a slow running river could be encountered where it remains brackish for quite a while. However, due to predation by larger Eleotrid gobies will happily eat small snails, and the gobies are abundant in slower moving waters; so basically, not many Neritina snails make it up these streams, so most dont bother to do so (they instinctivally head for smaller streams). About 80% of the Nerites move up the main channel of the stream, wheras 20% opt for a slower side stream. This preferance for small, fast flowing streams means that they will only spend a little time in brackish water, but time in it will be spend, so they need to be able to adapt to it. Floods also wash larger adults down into the brackish areas, so they have to adapt quickly to survive. This is why they can live in brackish water even though they are freshwater snails, although for long term care freshwater is best. The eggs are laid in freshwater, but travel down into a marine environment where they hatch and move back up into the streams.

So, thats the ecology behind it, now for breeding. The eggs which Neritina snails lay in freshwater aquaria are viable and fine to use for breeding. I would collect a number of these eggs and transfer them to a tank of marine salinity. The babies should hatch. The salinity can then be reduced gradulally after a month or so until by the end, you have some sub adult (maby 7mm long, but thats an educated guess) Neritina snails. There is however one problem: their food. You will need to provide copious amounts of food for the babies as they grow, the soft brown algae that grows in aquaria is the best food for them. This is not easy to do, and I have not heard of anyone raising the larvea.

I hope this clears a few things up.

 

[three-fingers]

Cheers for that, it's very interesting . I'm not quite sure about everything though.

The eggs are laid in freshwater, but travel down into a marine environment where they hatch and move back up into the streams.

Is it the eggs that actually travel downstream, or the larvae? Because all the eggs I've seen have been stuck on to stones/bogwood wood pretty hard, even my loaches have a tough time with them . I can't really see them travelling downstream very fast. Nerites are pretty well known for having eggs like this: "The egg capsules of certain Neritidae".

This leads me to believe that the described method of breeding isn't the case here. I'm not sure however, as I've not seen the sources on nerite breeding so don't know what they say, there's quite possibly more to it.

As for the breeding cycle, seeing as its important to say something about it before someone gets upset; it is hard to say for sure exactly what it is because many different species (freshwater, brackish and marine) are sold for aquaria. For now, I will try to deal with Neritina species, the most common freshwater species sold for aquaria.

Maybe it's the case that species within the Neritina genus have different methods of breeding? And it's possible that your sources have only been referring to snails of the genus Neritina and subgenus Neritina...though I don't know since I've not seen the sources. That doesn't fit in with the fact that the paper "The egg capsules of certain Neritidae" deals with both Neritina (Neritina) and Neritina (Vittina) species either.

Do we even know which species we are talking about here though? Because (for me anyway) it's hard enough to find information on nerite ecology, but if we don't know which species we have, then any info we do find is probably going to be inaccurate.

I have 'zebra nerites' too and some places list them as Vittina coromandeliana (like this site) and some places list them as Neritina natalensis (like this site). I've seen other names too, usually those two mixed together and/or spelt differently.

The taxonomy of nerite snails seems fairly complicated me, just take a look: [URL="http/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neritidae"]http/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neritidae[/URL]
From all the above It would appear that Vittina is a subgenus of the genus Neritina, making our snails either Neritina (Neritina) natalensis(such as here) or Neritina (Vittina) coromandeliana (such as here).

I've just taken a snail out from my tank, and compared it to the images in the last two links. I haven't the foggiest idea how to tell the difference between the two...especially with the snail still in the shell .

Anyone know how to tell?

 

[severum boy]

The eggs are laid in freshwater, but travel down into a marine environment where they hatch and move back up into the streams.

Is it the eggs that actually travel downstream, or the larvae? Because all the eggs I've seen have been stuck on to stones/bogwood wood pretty hard, even my loaches have a tough time with them . I can't really see them travelling downstream very fast. Nerites are pretty well known for having eggs like this: "The egg capsules of certain Neritidae".

This leads me to believe that the described method of breeding isn't the case here. I'm not sure however, as I've not seen the sources on nerite breeding so don't know what they say, there's quite possibly more to it.

Thanks Threefingers.
Its a tricky subject, not much is known or available with my resources on them. I was dealing with two Hawian species of Nerite, and everything I found out seemed to fit well with what I have experienced and learnt. Both the eggs and larvae travel downstream. The eggs hatch into the larvae which float dowstream, but the eggs only move downstream if there is a flood or other large water dispersal. As you correctly say, Nerite eggs are solidly rooted to the surface they are layed on, but if they are laid on gravel or sand, then they move with the sand or stone that they are ancored to. I to think there is more to it, but what we need is someone to write a scientific paper on their breeding habits.

As for the breeding cycle, seeing as its important to say something about it before someone gets upset; it is hard to say for sure exactly what it is because many different species (freshwater, brackish and marine) are sold for aquaria. For now, I will try to deal with Neritina species, the most common freshwater species sold for aquaria.

Maybe it's the case that species within the Neritina genus have different methods of breeding? And it's possible that your sources have only been referring to snails of the genus Neritina and subgenus Neritina...though I don't know since I've not seen the sources. That doesn't fit in with the fact that the paper "The egg capsules of certain Neritidae" deals with both Neritina (Neritina) and Neritina (Vittina) species either.

They could well do. I have no idea what sub-genus the sources were talking about, but maby there are no breeding differences between the sub-genus'? From what I know, there are a fair few Neritina species, so there probably are differences in their breeding. I took the species name from Neale Monk's post in the Nerite post in the Freshwater Invertebrates profiles.

Do we even know which species we are talking about here though? Because (for me anyway) it's hard enough to find information on nerite ecology, but if we don't know which species we have, then any info we do find is probably going to be inaccurate.
I have 'zebra nerites' too and some places list them as Vittina coromandeliana (like this site) and some places list them as Neritina natalensis (like this site). I've seen other names too, usually those two mixed together and/or spelt differently.
The taxonomy of nerite snails seems fairly complicated me, just take a look: [URL="http/"http/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neritidae""]http/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neritidae[/URL]
From all the above It would appear that Vittina is a subgenus of the genus Neritina, making our snails either Neritina (Neritina) natalensis(such as here) or Neritina (Vittina) coromandeliana (such as here).
I've just taken a snail out from my tank, and compared it to the images in the last two links. I haven't the foggiest idea how to tell the difference between the two...especially with the snail still in the shell .
Anyone know how to tell?

Your damn right, the taxology is a nightmare. I have no idea how to differentiate between the sub-genus', but im guessing that its tricky. Also add in the fact of the variability of Nerites, and it seems to me to be a tricky subject. I am not a taxologist, and know of no-one who knows about them. I may e-mail the Natural History Museum to see what leads that they can give.

 

[Esfa]

well this is getting confusing for my small mind, so I'll just say thanks.

 

[three-fingers]

Your damn right, the taxology is a nightmare. I have no idea how to differentiate between the sub-genus', but im guessing that its tricky. Also add in the fact of the variability of Nerites, and it seems to me to be a tricky subject. I am not a taxologist, and know of no-one who knows about them. I may e-mail the Natural History Museum to see what leads that they can give.

That's a pretty good idea, maybe the defining factor is something like it's ecology, or the appearance of the snail inside the shell. Would be good to know which species we have, and better yet how to breed them - sounds like an interesting process and I may just give it a try the next time I find eggs on something removable in my tank.

 

[Feiy]

I knew a man who was successfully bred Olive Nerite snails. He used to be my neighbor three or four years ago, got me interested in fish keeping as well.

I recall that he was raising a batch of around 20-25 of the little things in a filter sand substrate tank with brackish water. They were about the size of half a pinkey nail. But when he tried to adapt them to freshwater, they started to die off. He tried to dilute certain tanks containing the snails with more freshwater. Couldn't successfully adapt them though. I think around 70% died off. He stopped trying and just kept the remaining in brackish water. Then he moved away so I can't really tell you what happened next.

 

[BracKeeper75]

I keep Olive Nerite Snails in "BW" sg 1.014...

They do in fact continue to lay eggs in "FW" and yes the eggs will hatch. My understanding from doing research is, that soon after they hatch they cannot continue to develop without medium "BW" 1.008/higher, and will shortly after die. This is again from research and not experience. The only Nerites that are truly "BW" nerites are Olive Nerites! (Vittina usnea (Neritina reclivata) The best way to be sure you have the right snail, is to get them from someone who breeds them.

 

[Eclecticoldsod]

One thing I don't understand about these snails: if hard water is best for them, why do they prefer acidic bog wood to lay their eggs on? Mine ignore tufa rock, flowerpots, and the glass tank walls, yet smother any piece of bog wood with eggs.

 

[Eclecticoldsod]

I seem to remember reading somewhere that Nerite snails go through several planktonic stages before actually becoming snails.

 

[demented pea]

Ihave just discovered these white things are nerite eggs! duh.

They are just over one small piece of bog wood and one or two of my apple snails!!!! I have two purple apple snails(among other colours) and these are verypopular with the nerites. I thought I had parasites... Thanks for all the info.