Just ordered some Olive Nerites

[gale]

Hoping they'll help with the algae in my big tank. I don't understand why it has so much algae and my 10 gallon doesn't, when the 10g gets more light and has less plants. hmph. Anyway the website I got them from says they're good at eating algae and I also ordered some new plants since the minimum was $35. I can't wait!!

 

[jflowers]

IME they are great for algae, mine are constantly cleaning the glass and rocks. If anything they are a little too good as I need to move them to different tanks so they always have some algae.

Jon

 

[gale]

woohoo! I should have them by friday-I'm antsy!

 

[Opcn]

I was under the impression that nerites where salt water, Am I incorrect?

 

[gale]

I was under the impression that nerites where salt water, Am I incorrect?

They are actually brackish snails but they can live in a freshwater tank if properly acclimated. The site I ordered them from acclimates them to freshwater before they ever sell them so they don't need to be re-acclimated (of course I will acclimate them to my tank water like I do with new fish). But yeah, I guess they are native to saltwater. They won't breed in freshwater-they will lay eggs but they don't ever hatch.

 

[gale]

Got my snails and plants today. Will check back about how they do on the algae (which I haven't been scraping the last couple weeks-I've been saving it for the snails. lol)

 

[gale]

I've had the olive snails for 3 days now. Prior to getting them I didn't scrape any algae for about 2 weeks. My 10 gallon tank has 4 of the snails in it and is facing a picture window so it gets lots of light. Somehow only the glass gets algae but the snails have it almost completely cleaned off. My 20 gallon tank has 8 snails and was pretty bad with the algae. Worse than the 10 for some strange reason because the 20 gets no natural light whatsoever. Anyway the snails have done a bang-up job of cleaning it. The front glass is almost completely clean and now some are working on the ornaments. Hopefully they will clean the plants a little too. This tank has a lot of algae.

Now when the tanks are clean, what do I feed the snails?

 

[fishyfeet]

I think they are herbivours and there for will eat vegetation and thing like algae wafers, and catfish pellets. di