Snail Eaters

[LouiseRat]

Hi Guys,

My first post so a bit rude to jump straight in with a question so a little about myself first.

I live in Plymouth Uk and an new to fish keeping so may ask some really stupid questions so be prepared LOL I have been sniffing around on here for a while now and you all seem to be a great bunch.

I have recently bought and setup a Juwel Rekord 120 which is currently going well so far I have 3 Pineapple Swordtails 1 of which gave birth the day I brought her home and at present there are at least 3 fry that have made it this far.

My other interest tend to involve cars and motorsport and I'm a committee member for SWS.

Right now to the meat of it.

I have been noticing several snail appearing very small and quite fast moving. I have been told that Clown Loaches are good snail eaters but think they would be too big for my tank what would you recommend?

I am aiming for a well stocked community tank with plenty of variety so don't want to use up all my capacity with only a few fish.

Thanks in advance

Ben

 

[JaminRat]

Sorry folks had a blonde moment and didn't realise my other half was signed in above post was from me.
I'm off to find a rock to hide behind.

 

[sylvia]

Lol Welcome JaminRat

What size tank do you have? Is a Juwel Rekord 120 30 (US) gallons?

Anyway, it would deffinately be too small for clown laoches (which, BTW, should also be kept in groups).

Before I suggest fish to take care of snails, let me argue the case for keeping them

I have snails in a few of my tanks. They arrive as hidden passengers on new plants. I choose to keep them. They eat algae off the plants and glass much mroe effectively than anything else I've found so far. They also eat any leftovers and seem to also consume bits of leaves that may rbeak off plants and start rotting on the substrate. Whereas they do reproduce quite quickly, I find their numbers don't explode exponentaily as the availability of food limmits them. Even when they do start appearing more often, I find I can remove just about enough individuals at every water change (either by picking them off the glass by hand or vaccuuming them up while I gravel vac.) to keep their presence from ebcoming extremely unsightly. Something else that can be easily done to control snail numbers is to place a bit of lettuce in the tank overnight and then collect all the snails (plus lettuce) that have gathered on it and dispose of them. As long as you don't have some severe dislike of snails, they are easy to tolerate and can actualy be beneficial. (I personaly think they are rather cute - try capturing a few and putting them in a glass of water and use a magnifying glass to watch them - they are very interesting little things and so much faster than land snails!).

If you still want to get rid of them using a fish (and I say you should deffinately use a fish if you want them completely gone - not one of those comemrcial snail-killing chemicals), there are a few other loaches (besides clown) that would work in a 30 gallon. One of these is the 'yo-yo' loach. Another is the 'zebra loach'.

http/loaches.com/species_pages/botia_almorhae.html - yo-yo (to about 4" but make shure you have the right species).
http/loaches.com/species_pages/botia_striata.html - zebra (to 3")

With both species, a small group (of about 4) is best. I'd avoid adding any other bottom-dwellers to allow the loaches the space they need and to prevent over-stocking as well. I have had some problems with zebra loaches and cories and both loach species can nip if kept with very long-finned, slow-moving fish (though they won't usualy pose a threat).

 

[JaminRat]

Thanks for the prompt reply they both look to very nice fish but you do have a point with keeping a few snails. I was worried because several people have told me that they easily get out of control. I will have to check LFS's to see what is available locally.

Is it just loaches that tend to munch snails or are there other species. I quite fancied one of the smaller varieties of catfish and being bottom dewlers also wouldn't get on well with the loaches.

Oh and yes it is the Rekord 120 31.4 USG I think

 

[JaminRat]

BTTT for a little more info.

 

[chochipnik]

Hi. Im also in Plymouth UK. I got a few snails when I bought
plants from endsleigh (plants gone now but snails haven't) and they are good at cleaning the tanks but I did notice that several more appeared quite quickly, if i notice them I squish them as the fish love to eat them but that got annoying so on advice I bought a yoyo loach from Emperor Tropicals in Mannamead although they do prefer to sell them in pairs they will sell seperately (I now have 2 though) he did say they were the best for my setup considering size etc but that I may still have to squish the snails for them to find them (pointless as my other fish eat them if squished anyway) the tank size is 2' 6", app 17g ( 81.6l ), PF3 Filter:

there is a site http/www.thinkfish.co.uk
they have a community creator you put in the sizes of your tank etc and look through some of the fish and it tells you more about each fish etc you can add them to your virtual tank and it will tell you if theres any problems etc. according to them my tank is stocked ok with what I have in there

 

[JaminRat]

Thanks for the link gives some very good info.

I haven't noticed anymore snails in the tank since the first sighting so as long as the numbers don't increase hugely I am happy to let them live. They are quite interesting to watch, I've never seen snails move so quick. I think if it's still a case of squishing them then I'll look toward small pleco species.

Thanks for all the help folks