One Baby Snail?!?

[kohyuta]

So in addition to having 2-3 fry (mentioned in another thread), I've just discovered a baby snail! We have a 12-gallon Eclipse12 system, and a golden mystery snail that we bought from PetSmart about 4-5 weeks ago. I've never noticed any egg clutches above the water line, so the baby snail has surprised the heck outta me! What's also surprising is that it's a black shell. We have all plastic plants, so I'm at a loss as to where it came from. I only see the one, and I'm concerned that there are more and they'll overrun our aquarium while we're gone for a week. I'm planning on doing a once over before we leave, so maybe I'll find more then.

Is is possible for a golden snail to have different color offspring? If there's only one, did the other fish (2 mollies, 2 platys, 2 ottos) eat the others? Ah the mystery! Thanks in advance!

 

[three-fingers]

I doubt its an apple snail, you need a male and a female to breed the, and as you say you would have noticed the eggs.

It's probably a regular tadpole or ramshorn snail, see this guide .

Don't worry about snails 'overrunning' your tank - they can only do that if there's food for them to eat, and your better off having snails than you are having bits of food decomposing in the tank . It probably came as a small see-though egg clutch on the apple snails shell or something.

 

[kohyuta]

Thanks for the reply! I think you're right, after looking through that great pinned thread on snails... just by shell shape it's not an apple snail. I was able to catch the lil' bugger for some pics. Cute little guy... it'll be interesting to see how the fry and snail grow while we're gone.

 

[darryl864]

Thanks for the reply! I think you're right, after looking through that great pinned thread on snails... just by shell shape it's not an apple snail. I was able to catch the lil' bugger for some pics. Cute little guy... it'll be interesting to see how the fry and snail grow while we're gone.

I have one of these too at the moment which must have come in on the plants I bought. It is about the same size as the one in the picture I dont suppose you could provide me with an update as to what it turned out to be and if it was OK to keep in the tank?

 

[Corleone]

Definitely looks like a pond snail or tadpole snail. According to the snail thread linked above, they can multiply quickly and damage live plants, so I think I'd remove it.

 

[darryl864]

Kill it, Kill it now.

I'll probably get shot down for this one. But when I first saw this post I let my curiosity get the better of me and left the snail in there. I am now getting rid of about 10-20 a day! Left alone these will quickly overrun a small tank, had I removed the first one I found I might not be trying so hard to get rid of them now.

If you do find you have lots of these in your tank I have found the best way to remove them is by adding a thick slice of cucumber at night and removing it in the morning. It will be covered in loads of snails!

I would say that these are my first newbie mistakes:

1. Clean all new plants thoroughly before adding to the tank.
2. Remove snails at first sight.