Seriously regretting decision to let snails breed...

[Animallover😍]

 

[Animallover😍]

Ok so I let my snails breed, and now they're all over my tank. Gonna try lettuce today but please give me some tips in the meantime. Thanks!

 

[DoubleDutch]

Assassinsnails will be your friends

 

[Animallover😍]

I saw your post and I can actually buy them online. If the lettuce doesn't work sure I'm getting them!

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Honestly I just learnt to enjoy them as part of a planted ecosystem. I used to have literally hundreds of "pest" snails along with the more useful ones in my tanks. They never did any harm, helped clean up leftover food and added more life to the tank.

If your tank is big enough then clown or yoyo loaches are pretty good snail predators that are pretty ok to keep with most things. Clown loaches get really big though so only suitable for really large tanks. As above assassin snails are pretty good too.

You can reduce population with the lettuce trick but you will never completely get rid of them unless there is something in the tank actively eating them.

Easiest option though is just let them get on with it and don't worry about them. I have the same attitude with my garden. Some people call them weeds, I call them native wild flowers

 

[Animallover😍]

Ok. The only problem I have with snails is the amount of waste. especially since it all gets trapped in my substrate.

 

[itiwhetu]

That is a very unusual substrate you have. Usually I would have something much finer that. Grain size 2-4mm

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Ok. The only problem I have with snails is the amount of waste. especially since it all gets trapped in my substrate.

Organic plant fertiliser

Seriously though I never noticed this issue with any of my tanks. Not sure why, maybe there was just a lot going in in mine and once it was all grown in I couldn't see the substrate anyway. I tend to stick to dark coloured substrates as well as it hides stuff like this a lot better.

I would say the fish poop is probably going to be a lot worse than that to be honest. Just get a good gravel vac.

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

Waste will also be a massive contributor to your snail population boom.
I suggest your review the amount you feed and introduce fasting days to your regime.

When assassin snails are mentioned, people often view their snail infestation and believe that they need lots of assassin snails to dal with it.
You don't and just two should suffice for your tank, coupled with the Snail Trap Trick.

 

[Jan Cavalieri]

When I had hundreds in a 29 gallon tank I couldn't stand them. So eventually I managed to get rid of almost all of them. Now I want some back - besides eating a lot of leftover food (and I'm bad about overfeeding), should they get out of hand again, they are my DoJo's favorite snack. The thought of feeding live food kind of grosses me out but once my saltwater/reef tank is up and running I'll probably be doing it more often. But I am only purchasing captive bred fish so they likely are nearly as happy with dried food as they are with live food - don't know about some of the corals though.

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

When I had hundreds in a 29 gallon tank I couldn't stand them. So eventually I managed to get rid of almost all of them. Now I want some back - besides eating a lot of leftover food (and I'm bad about overfeeding), should they get out of hand again, they are my DoJo's favorite snack. The thought of feeding live food kind of grosses me out but once my saltwater/reef tank is up and running I'll probably be doing it more often. But I am only purchasing captive bred fish so they likely are nearly as happy with dried food as they are with live food - don't know about some of the corals though.

Perhaps for your freshwater tank, you could contemplate nerites...they come in a variety of colours, do a great job of keeping down algae and waste AND they won't breed.

 

[Lajos_Detari]

Actually it's easy to kill snails by using Coppersafe(which is used to treat white spot disease).

But make sure that you don't have shrimps in your tank now or in the future, else the Coppersafe will kill the shrimps.

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

Actually it's easy to kill snails by using Coppersafe(which is used to treat white spot disease).

But make sure that you don't have shrimps in your tank now or in the future, else the Coppersafe will kill the shrimps.

And you'll get a lot of dead snails, many buried deep within the substrate...and a likely ammonia 'spike' as a consequence.

 

[Lajos_Detari]

And you'll get a lot of dead snails, many buried deep within the substrate...and a likely ammonia 'spike' as a consequence.

You are right. Just do a good clean up by removing all the dead snails and do a large water change after the medication.

You can do it probably 1-2 days before you do your weekly water change.

 

[Myraan]

Perhaps for your freshwater tank, you could contemplate nerites...they come in a variety of colours, do a great job of keeping down algae and waste AND they won't breed.
View attachment 143474View attachment 143475

Nerites are nice, I miss mine (they hitched a lift on the internal filter one cleaning day and eventually dried out and died crawling around the carpet), but it could be argued the sterile eggs are way more ugly than an explosion of cute little pest snail babies.