Enduring Power of pest snails

[LarsB]

First I have nothing against pest snails and consider them just part of the clean up crew.
But this happened today and happens to shoot home just how enduring these little critters are, not to mention how they got the moniker of 'pest'...
(ignore the blue stones at the bottom right of first pic, NOT snails!)

In the fall of 2018, i brought my plants in from outdoors, and devised several ways to add more humidity around certain plants are areas that needed it. One way was using several 1 gallon, old style goldfish bowls I had around, not being used. I kept these 3/4 to half full and after the winter, they remained in place until this year, when the plant came in, I started to fill them again in heating season. So they were like this, for a good 15-16 months until today. Just water and what ever plant material may have fallen in.... and in one bowl, were so terracotta pottery shards. I often use these in tank decor.
Today I get them moved, cleaning them up, have other plans for them and lo-and-behold, this bowl with the shards has not one, but two (possibly 3) types of pest snails , living in there, and it is not a 1/3 full of water!!! Amber ramshorn snails, one was quite large, but is now just a shelll, many smaller ones of the same, some trumpet snails and some others that are tiny but could be common pond snails... Yeah, tuff lit shitz! LOL
Like I needed more snails!

That being said, the last pic is how you set a snail trap! (out of the pleco tank)
ADDED FUNNY!
(someone asked WHY I had a fork on the zucchini in the baby pleco tank... I just looked blankly at her and said, "they have to hold it somehow, they dont have fingers!" she was quite..... next time I was feeding green beans, I mentioned they were french cut, that is what they had to have .. she asked why, I did the blank out look again and said "The long fins ones are too snooty to eat regular cut"... she almost bought it that time!!! Hehehe

 

[Retired Viking]

They do seem to be hard to get rid of. I have a couple of ramshorn snails show up in my shrimp tank, they are small and I left them alone, my community tank had over 100 pond snails that I captured and I still find 3-4 a day if not more. I have nerite snails in both tanks already. The only tank without pond snails is my turtle tank, they eat them on site I cut back on how much I feed my fish to reduce leftovers for the snails.

 

[Munroco]

I set up a few plastic 100 litre tubs in my back garden with a view to culturing daphnia and harvesting gnat and mosquito larvae. I filled them with tap water and bought a bag of daphnia from my LFS to seed the tubs and that is all I put in them. Within a few months in addition to daphnia, I had pond snails, ramshorn snails, scuds, leeches, water beetles and some other stuff that I haven't identified yet. I assume they all come in through bird droppings but who knows.

As well as fish, I have some shrimp only tanks indoors. Without fail they get populated with seed shrimp and sometimes a type of small freshwater clam (I think). These things appear by magic, but they don't do any harm so I don't mind them.

 

[Linda N]

I live in the high desert of NM and have large 30 gallon trash cans here and there throughout my yard. They are filled with water so I can use that water to fill bird baths and hand water individual plants if needed, without having to fire up my irrigation pump. After a year or so, the one in the shadiest part of the yard had a pretty good snail population. Now if my tank population gets out of hand, that's where they go. The other trash cans that are in full sun do not have snails. I am assuming because the water gets too warm in them from sun exposure.

 

[Retired Viking]

I live in the high desert of NM and have large 30 gallon trash cans here and there throughout my yard. They are filled with water so I can use that water to fill bird baths and hand water individual plants if needed, without having to fire up my irrigation pump. After a year or so, the one in the shadiest part of the yard had a pretty good snail population. Now if my tank population gets out of hand, that's where they go. The other trash cans that are in full sun do not have snails. I am assuming because the water gets too warm in them from sun exposure.

That sounds logical, I know how hot it gets down there, wish some of the heat would make it's way up here. It's cold!!!!!

 

[LarsB]

Linda, that all makes sense. I have to be careful here, so I am trying white cloud minnows this year, to eat the 'skitter fry!