What Is This Stowaway ?

[Hoody]

My recently planted aquarium has a visitor. Its a snail and it must have stowed away on the plants when i bought them... What kind of snail is this ? Is it detrimental to my plants ? Is it going to be a problem for my fish ? I don't think its eaten (any noticeable amount anyway) plants as yet and they've been in over a week now

Any advice welcome ! Thanks in advance,

Graham

 

[KittyKat]

Physa snail: I found this species to be completely harmless and they usually do not breed out of control like some others.

 

[minnnt]

Nice picture.

Nice Golf too..

 

[Delloy12]

Those snails ate all my plants and bred crazy, I've only had these once and that's when I first started

 

[KittyKat]

Those snails ate all my plants and bred crazy

Interesting, which species of plants? How much did you feed?

 

[soybean]

Snails will only become a problem if you overfeed the tank. No excess food = no population boom.

 

[Delloy12]

Those snails ate all my plants and bred crazy

Interesting, which species of plants? How much did you feed?

if I can remember (it was about 7yrs ago) I had amazon swords and vallis

 

[Hoody]

Physa snail: I found this species to be completely harmless and they usually do not breed out of control like some others.

Thank you. I'll leave him to his business then

Nice picture.

Nice Golf too..

Ta Its actually a lot harder than i thought to get decent pics of it... Blooming things tiny !! Cant use the flash against the glass and getting a fast enough shutter speed for it not to blur in the current....

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Do these little fellas turn into BIG fellas or is this how big they grow ? Also is he just an algae grazer ?

 

[Scott MacAdam]

I've got one in my fry tank. Came in on the plants I bought. It was TINY when I first noticed it a few months ago but I saw it recenty and it had gotten quite a bit larger, still just the one as far as I know though.

 

[KittyKat]

Do these little fellas turn into BIG fellas or is this how big they grow ? Also is he just an algae grazer ?

Depends on the species, the smaller ones are around 10 mm long, the bigger ones (pond snails, yours doesn't look like one) grow to about 20 mm long. I suspect yours is one of the smaller species. They will eat some algae, but mostly leftover fish food, in my experience.