Can Snails Be Food

[iroc]

So here is my problem/question.

My community tank is being overun with snails, At 1st I thought no big deal but they are eating the plants and have to go. I never bought them they came on a live plant and at this point I take out like 5 a day and always find new ones. I have a Cichlid tank and I was wondering could I throw some in there and whould they eat them, and would that be ok. currently both tanks are fed some flake and frozen bloodworms.

Oh the Cichlids are a blood parrot and a green severum

 

[vancouver]

It's possible.. when I tried putting smallish snails in my cichlid tanks they always disappeared.. so I assumed they were eaten..

What kind of snails are they?.. some sort of red ramshorn probably

 

[SPLiSH]

The cichlids may eat them, depending on size. Most loaches love small snails.

 

[voo]

Be careful, you could end up with 2 infected tanks
Add one perhaps and see if it gets eated. Usually they'll leave the shell lying around somewhere. I'd make it a smaller snail so that there's less chance it can lay eggs

 

[iroc]

well there are plenty of small ones so I will start there. I don't know what kind of snails they are but they do have a redish shell. When I do my de-snailing of the community tank tonight I'll gonna put one in the other tank and see if it goes bye bye, this could turn out to be good cuts down on food costs.........ROFL

 

[jayjay]

Yes cichlids may eat snails, though they will still need other foods. Severums like green foods so will probably eat the plants. Also 20g isn't big enough for a severum and bp Are you upgrading the tank?

 

[sankyj]

Clown Loach are brilliant snail eaters, don't know if you have room for a couple, but they can definately reduce the amount

 

[LoachLover]

Any Botia loach will love snails, but I think some cichlids will eat them as well.

 

[Spinal]

Found out this morning that crayfish like snacking on snails... (grrr... I wanted that snail, it was a one-of-a-kind in my tank... I was waiting for it to reproduce!!!)
Michele

 

[scubadoo]

Clown Loach are brilliant snail eaters, don't know if you have room for a couple, but they can definately reduce the amount

Errrmmm - nope he doesn't - Clown Loaches grow rather too large for a 20Gal

Minimum would be about 50 gals - and they are best kept in groups of 4 or more since they're pretty sociable fish.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

my parrot will much on snails quite happily, but why risk infecting 2 tanks, if your gonna take them out and want them dead anyway then just sling them, why put them into another tank??

if your dead set on it then put them in the new tank but squish them so they're dead, no chance of them reproducing and the fish are much more likely to eat them.

 

[iroc]

To answer a couple of questions:

I never intented on the snails being their only source of food it was more of a query then anything else, and I'm not concerned with getting a snail outbrake in the cichlid tank becuase I will be upgrading that tank very soon to a larger tank which is better suited for them. I was giving the tank along with the fish and it has NEVER been my intention to keep them in there. As soon as I get the bigger tank I will be setting it up, I was giving a filter with ready to go media so the whole transtion will be short. And as of yet the cichlids havn't been eating the plants but it's only a 4 water onions and a big sword plant in there with them.