My littlest snail is empty

[gale]

I have 3 snails in my 10g tank. 2 are bigger and one is tiny-maybe 1 mm in diameter. (I only pretend to know what a mm is. He's very little). So I was looking in there last night and see just the shell. I know the snail is not in there because I can see through it and tonight it's in the same place. Would one of the fish have eaten it? The snails have been in there for at least a couple of weeks now.

 

[Hsieyun]

If it's in the same tank as the betta, I wouldn't doubt it. My female betta was a serial snail killer (Margaret Thatcher, Queen Elizabeth, Tony Blair I-V).

 

[gale]

If it's in the same tank as the betta, I wouldn't doubt it. My female betta was a serial snail killer (Margaret Thatcher, Queen Elizabeth, Tony Blair I-V).

Uh oh does that mean my bigger snails might be at risk? They are about 1/4 inch diameter and she's small-maybe an inch long not including her tailfin. She does look a little shifty...

 

[DarkSide]

It could have died, and then the ghost shrimp ate the body.

 

[Inchworm]

Hi gale

When a snail dies, for whatever reason, the trap door in it's shell will open and any meat eating fish is likely to take advantage of the opportunity for a tasty snack. It's possible that this might have happened too.

 

[Hsieyun]

If it's in the same tank as the betta, I wouldn't doubt it. My female betta was a serial snail killer (Margaret Thatcher, Queen Elizabeth, Tony Blair I-V).

Uh oh does that mean my bigger snails might be at risk? They are about 1/4 inch diameter and she's small-maybe an inch long not including her tailfin. She does look a little shifty...

Not necessarily. My other bettas were always fine with their snails. I'd keep an eye on her, though.

 

[Sorrell]

I would agree with Inch's theory that it died and someone cleaned it out. Usually when a betta eats a snail they'll take the whole thing, shell and all.

 

[gale]

I've lost another, only this time in my male betta's tank. Earlier tonight it was moving up the wall like normal. A few hours ago I heard what sounded like rocks dropping and looked over and my male was in the corner toward the bottom. Not really unusual though. I went over and looked and right where he was, I see the empty shell of a snail. It was a bigger one too-almost 1/4 inch. I'm sad because this was my first ever snail that came in on my plants. My kids and I spent a lot of time staring at it when it was in the 20g tank, but I moved it to the small tank because we could never find it in the big one and my kids love looking for it.

oh well.

 

[Hsieyun]

I would agree with Inch's theory that it died and someone cleaned it out. Usually when a betta eats a snail they'll take the whole thing, shell and all.

Agryphon would usually leave the shells.

You're probably right, though.