Snail On My Hornwort

[FoundMoney]

I received a whole bunch of tropical hornwort (ceratophyllum demersum) from the Aquatic Plant Depot. After putting it in the tank I was looking at it and I noticed a small snail happily crawling on it. This kind of freaked me out so I took it out right away. But I started thinking that if there is one snail there are probably others.

Should I be concerned about snails in my tank? Is there a benefit to having snails?I don't mind having a variety of aquatic life as long as it doesn't hurt anything. I have read about some people being overrun with snails and others who put them in the tank to eat algae (I think ).

 

[gwlee7]

Welcome to the crazy world of fish keeping. The snail you have is probably the kind like I had which are not necessarily the kind you want. . I have crushed a whole bunch of them after some hitched a ride on a store bought plant into my 55 gallon when it was my community tank.

 

[Yenko]

What shape is it's shell? If it's a cone-shaped shell, you should be happy; Malasian trumpet snails are a great addition to any tank. If you don't want them, Kribensis will eat them.

 

[Glostik]

My clown loaches would be glad to have a few extra snails laying around =D

 

[FoundMoney]

It looks like this:

I wouldn't exactly say it's cone shaped, sort of bulbish with a cone-like tail end to the shell. It sure poops a lot!

 

[Yenko]

Don't know what kind of snail it is. If it doesn't eat plants then it's a good thing for your tank; don't belive the horror stories. My dad had a planted tank completely overrun with ramshorn snails; the tank never looked better.

 

[FoundMoney]

If it doesn't eat plants (and if it came in on my plants) what does it eat?

 

[FoundMoney]

OK, what the heck. I put the little critter back in. If there's one there's bound to be eggs in there, too. As a matter of fact I think I just removed an egg sack from one of my plants not knowing what it was. It was a clear globule. It seems that if snails don't eat plants they eat algae, which is definitely welcome in my tank.

 

[Paradise_Gourami]

snails are EVIL ii had huge outbreaks of snails in both my tanks after first started putting plants in my tank, at the peak of their population there were definatly more than 1 or 2 hundred . they reproduce uncontrollably and are very hard to controll without buying anything(chemicals or what ever). in one tank i found that clown loaches make a snack out of them and get rid of them (for future reference)

 

[FoundMoney]

Oh well, too late now. I put it back in and it was on the glass. I turned away for five minutes and it was gone, no doubt starting to terrorize my tank.

 

[Genki]

I wouldn't be too worried. A couple of those aren't going to be able to mow down your plants. If you start seeing more then you like an easy way to get rid of them is to put a plate with lettuce on it in the tank (weigh the lettuce down with gravel or something) and leave it there over night. In the morning you'll have a tray of snails you can pull out, probably cut your population in half.

I've had probably a good 30-40 of them running around my 55gal planted tank for about a month now, and I haven't seen any damge.

Oh, and also, it's not a Malasian trumpet snail. It's just a common pond snail that hitches rides on every plant in aquarium history.

 

[jimbooo]

i had one of those in a 2 gallon. within 3 weeks i had hundreds, KILL KILL KILL

or you never will.

up to you though but there not exactly pretty. if you want hundreds of the buggers in your tank you may as well buy nice looking ones from the LFS