Trumpet Snails

[Polley]

So I bought some grass for my Molly fry (I have four of them, along with three fully grown black mollys and two fully grown platies) and I poured in some of the water.


Later on, I found two snails with conical shells, and did some research, finding out they were trumpet snails and some people find them good, while others find them a nuissance. What I was wondering was whether they really did serve a purpose, and if they get out of hand would my pleco take care of them for me?

 

[Amerce]

If you have a planted tank then they are good as they stop dead spots occurring, but they can become a pest.

If your fish like them then they might munch on a few and keep the number down, or you might find some members who will take them off your hands to feed their puffers etc or you can just net them out and throw them away (put a cucumber in the tank and the snails will go to that and just net em then).

 

[Mikaila31]

Meh... I don't really have any opinion on them. I've got MTS, ramshorn, and pond snails all were hitchhikers. I spent a while trying to get rid of them, tried everything under the sun basically. Nothing worked, so I've learned to live with them. They don't bother me as much now, at least MTS hid during the day. They don't do anything bad and the # can usually be controlled.

Every now and then I squish some of the ramshorns if they annoy me. The fishies love when I do that.

 

[Gav935]

Same here, not a lot you can do to get rid of them once they're in, it's the pond snails that annoy me more, as said above at least the MTS have the decency to hide...

 

[loraxchick]

mts will also help keep sand substrate turned over, if you have sand in your tank...
and snail usually only get out of control when there is lots of food available to the snails (so dont feed the tank as much and numbers should go down).
cheers

 

[saltynay]

You feed to much they will become a pest. I add them to my tanks as they are detritivores and thus I rarely have to gravel vac, in my newest tank I only gravel vac once a month my clean up crew keep the sand fairly pristine so I don't have to any more often.

 

[twin54]

I had hitch hikers as well....they were snails....but the hitch hiked to the wrong tank..... Plopped them in my tank that is home to 4 YOYO loaches! Basically if you have just about any type of loach snail hitch hikers = free snaks!

 

[Polley]

You feed to much they will become a pest. I add them to my tanks as they are detritivores and thus I rarely have to gravel vac, in my newest tank I only gravel vac once a month my clean up crew keep the sand fairly pristine so I don't have to any more often.

So they'll actually clean my tank for me, but if I put too much food in, there'll be too many of them?

What if I only have a small 10g tank? I was mostly worried about overcrowding since I have a pleco, three mollies and two platies and then some fry that are here and more that are on their way (yes I'm looking at giving them to the pet store).

 

[Bebobb]

I personally don't like this type of snail because they repopulate QUICKLY! I would take them out and find some place to put them. Take a lettuce leaf and put it in there at night and when you wake up in the morning a lot of snails will be on the leaf. If you want go and put the leaf in a creak or something, or just throw it away.

 

[three-fingers]

Depends on what you class as "too many of them".

I have MTS and lots of other snails in all my tanks, and find them interesting, so I don't care when/if I end up with thousands due to excess feeding.

They are good for the tank ecosystem as a whole (basically acting like earthworms), and they have to abide by the laws of physics, so if you end up with what you think looks like "too many" of them, it's probably a good thing because it will mean there's less waste food/rotting organic matter lying around.

Plecs don't eat snails, but loaches such as clowns, yo-yos, zebras and dwarf chain loaches do an excellent job of regulating numbers if you have a particularly messy tank (not that there's anything wrong with that, more natural).

They are only really an issue for people who don't really like snails IMO, and in most regular aquariums they wont be very noticeable, since they spend a lot of time in the substrate during the day and might not even reproduce that much.

Main points:

• Beneficial to tank.
• Might not multiply much.
• Can be controlled to a degree by some fish.
• Once you have them, you basically cant get rid of them.
• Do no harm at all.

 

[loraxchick]

Three fingers-
this is precisely my experience and thought about having snails...lots and lots to me,looks as though there is too much organic matter and the snails breed...their populations have always seemed self-limiting to me and i could never put my observations into such clear words...i LOVE snails! AND YOUVE VERBALIZED MY REASONING(AS WELL AS THEY ADD ADDED DEMENTION TO YOUR LIVESTOCK AND ARE REALLY INTERESTING!...srry about the caps..i am not a good typist.
cheers