Cracked shell in mystery snail?

[BettaFishGirl]

I have a 5.5 gallon tank that has 4 Male guppies, some cherry shrimp and a mystery snail. A couple weeks ago I noticed this crack in my mystery snails shell. He's always moving around the tank and is pretty much inhales algae wafers, so not sure why his shell cracked.

Water Parameters:
Ammonia-0
Nitrite-0
Nitrate-Didn't test today but usually around 10
pH-7.6

I've been feeding him crushed pest snails every 3 days or so because I figured the shells would help with calcium, but it doesn't seem to be getting better, or worse. Should I get some sort of other calcium? I've heard of wonder shell, and my LFS sells it so I could get some of that.

 

[Donya]

Hard to tell for sure but looks more like a scratch or growth line than a crack. Those can happen from rubbing against things in the tank and then having a growth spurt. Outer shell layers don't heal - once the protein layer is gone it stays that way.

Don't feed crushed snails; most likely they just add waste to the water. Even if the apple snail eats them (unlikely and not a good thing to encourage should it ever go in with other ornamental snails), physa pest snails have very little calcium in their shells. You can also get quite a nasty infection from them if crushing them bare handed.

Shrimp pellets and broken off bits of those little weekend feeder blocks that have a calcium carbonate matrix with food inside are more likely to provide dietary calcium, but keeping the ph and kh up is most important.

I've never heard of that other product you mentioned.

 

[BettaFishGirl]

Hard to tell for sure but looks more like a scratch or growth line than a crack. Those can happen from rubbing against things in the tank and then having a growth spurt. Outer shell layers don't heal - once the protein layer is gone it stays that way.

Don't feed crushed snails; most likely they just add waste to the water. Even if the apple snail eats them (unlikely and not a good thing to encourage should it ever go in with other ornamental snails), physa pest snails have very little calcium in their shells. You can also get quite a nasty infection from them if crushing them bare handed.

Shrimp pellets and broken off bits of those little weekend feeder blocks that have a calcium carbonate matrix with food inside are more likely to provide dietary calcium, but keeping the ph and kh up is most important.

I've never heard of that other product you mentioned.

Thank you! I've been crushing the pest snails with the end of my tongs but I will stop doing that.

I've seen the white vacation feeders at PetSmart - those? And do I have to powder them or just drop it down a little bit like an algae wafer?

 

[Donya]

Thank you! I've been crushing the pest snails with the end of my tongs but I will stop doing that.

I've seen the white vacation feeders at PetSmart - those? And do I have to powder them or just drop it down a little bit like an algae wafer?

Just drop the feeders in. They should sink and get snail attention if you don't add other food for a bit. To maximize how much they get nibbled vs just dissolving, if it's a big feeder block you can also break pieces off and just add those as they are eaten. Back when I had apple snails and used that trick, I found the fresh surfaces with more exposed food bits got more snail attention than if I added the feeder as-is, but of course the tiny ones meant for things like single betas can't really be broken, so those can just go in whole.

 

[BettaFishGirl]

Just drop the feeders in. They should sink and get snail attention if you don't add other food for a bit. To maximize how much they get nibbled vs just dissolving, if it's a big feeder block you can also break pieces off and just add those as they are eaten. Back when I had apple snails and used that trick, I found the fresh surfaces with more exposed food bits got more snail attention than if I added the feeder as-is, but of course the tiny ones meant for things like single betas can't really be broken, so those can just go in whole.

Great, thanks so much!

 

[Boundava]

So the vacation food bits should be added when your not feeding anything else otherwise you can have issues with overfeeding.

Cuttle bones (found in bird section of pet store) is another source of calcium. It will float so you can break off a little bit and use a clip to anchor it to the side of the tank.

 

[BettaFishGirl]

So the vacation food bits should be added when your not feeding anything else otherwise you can have issues with overfeeding.

Cuttle bones (found in bird section of pet store) is another source of calcium. It will float so you can break off a little bit and use a clip to anchor it to the side of the tank.

I fast my fish once a week, so I will drop it in then.

 

[Donya]

Cuttle bones (found in bird section of pet store) is another source of calcium.

They are also risky, even if the risk is small. It's rare, but you can get them with embedded bits of tissue that start to rot once wet and oh my lord the smell when that happens - I speak from experience unfortunately. Happened twice and then I never used them again. That was a long time ago so maybe the supply is better now, but it can be disastrous in a small tank when that happens and many snails won't touch them even when they're clean and fine. Cuttlebones dissolve relatively poorly IME and just add anothing piece of junk in the tank. Aragonitic rocks are way better for going the water dissolution route for maintaining high KH and pH.

 

[Boundava]

Hmm, never had that issue with cuttlebones and my snails would pile up on them. I did break them up into nickle-quarter sized bits and secured them by suction cup clip or even crazy glue to a rock.