Thedoxus Fluviatilis, Freshwater-Breeding Nerite Snail

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frothhelmet

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Livestock: Originally from a German breeder. These are genuine freshwater nerites that will breed and complete their lifecycle in 100% freshwater. They stay quite small, max size about 1cm when full grown and live about a year. You must be careful when handling them as their shells are not as hard as brackish-nerites. Their soft fleshy bits are also quite delicate and you must be careful with them. They breed slowly compared to most snails and therefore are quite expensive.They will absolutely annihilate all algae on hard surfaces. They really have some of the most beautiful mosaic-like shells I have seen on freshwater snails. I have kept them on and off for the past 3 years, but over the past year I have finally figured out how to keep and breed them successfully. From my experience the following will ensure that you can keep them alive and breeding too.
 
1. The tank they are in should get significant amounts of direct sunlight or algae production will be insufficient and they will die. Nerites cannot be deliberately fed. They will not seek food you drop in the tank. They must have food on the hard surfaces they randomly frequent or they will starve.
 
2. Ph must not be below 7 or their shells will erode white and this will eventually kill them. I keep them in straight up London tap-water with Ph 8 and Kh 13. The UKAPS member Basil used to keep and breed them at Ph 6.0-6.5 and Kh 2, but in my experience this does not work.
 
3. There must not be other snails in the tank competing for algae other than MTS (Ramshorns, &c are a no-no).
 
4. I killed them once in a tank that exceeded 34C over the summer. I keep them with a heater but the German breeder I got them from doesnt, so it's not necessary.
 
5. If they detach from the tank walls and 'pucker up' their foot they are not happy and need to be moved immediately to a different tank that meets the above parameters or they will die.
 
Quantity for sale: Perhaps about 20 altogether
Reason for Sale: so others can enjoy
Delivery or Collection: Both
Sales price: £4/snail
Postage & Packaging: £4 flat-rate. I have to pack them carefully. I can only ship if the weather isnt too hot.
Location: London, SE4
Payment Paypal only. Please PM to arrange transaction.
 
All photos are of my snails.
cimg8050.jpg

 
You can see the algae they have cleaned off the tank walls shortly after I added them to this tank here. That is a nerite on the glass.
cimg8101.jpg
 
Is the £4 including delivery?


I get a hell of a lot of brown algae all over the my slate cave and plastic plants, would they clear all that off?
 
Hi Marie, they will clear off 'powder' -type algae on surfaces-which I would guess is diatoms in your case very very well. My only concern would be the long-term survivability in your tank. Is it a healthy tank and does it meet the requirements 1-5 above? Alternatively you could get ramshorn snails which are much hardier. Cheers, Gerard
 
very interested in these. i have a number of different types of nerites split across three tanks. would they be able to co exist or would they need to be on their own.
 
They coexist with other nerites fine, so long as there is still ample algae for them to feed on.
 
No, they never leave the water like some brackish species in my experience.
 
I now have some more available if you are interested. Cheers
 

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