Which Snail Is Best?

[flumpit2]

hi all,im planning on buying some snails for my 24G (uk) cold water (naturaly 23/24 degrees C) tank to help keep the sand substrate turned over abit and i was wondering which snail is best to get?iv currently got white cloud mountain minnows & peppered cory adults & fry in there.would either of these snails cause any problems to my cory fry or my plants?

one minute im going to get mts,then apple snails,then mts again.im so undecided so any help & advice is much apprechiated.

btw,how fast do mts actualy reproduce?are they really a pest or a god send?

thanks in advance. shaz

 

[Bloo]

Most applesnails will devour plants and do not affect the substrate at all. MTS would be better suited.

It depends how much leftover food you have lying around and if you overfeed. They will have a population explosion if you overfeed.

 

[flumpit2]

thanx for that bloo,i think il be getting some MTS then.how many is a good number to start with?i put my hands up to over feeding the fish slightly but not too much and the filter seems to remove any of whats left so i shouldnt have too much of a problem with them taking over the tank.

do most lfs sell them?the lfs around here seem to sell most other snails but not them and they look at me gone out when i enquire about them,lol.

thanks again.shaz

 

[Bloo]

Check out the buy/sell section here - there are often people actually trying to get of surplus snails. And shops should almost not charge for them as they are probably in most tanks anyway. They are nocturnal so bury themselves in the substrate throughout the day.

 

[flumpit2]

thanks once again bloo,your a star!!!! gona go & check out the buy/sell section now.might put a wanted up for some.thanks again!!! shaz

 

[soritan]

'Apple Snail' is a broad, common name. Commercially avaiable 'Apple Snails' tend to either be Cana (Pomacea canaliculata) or Brig (Pomacea bridgesii). Canas eat plants, Brigs only eat soft or rotting plants, and can actually die of starvation in a fully planted tank if all the plants are healthy. Neither are able to subsist only on algae (unless there are gobs, gobs, GOBS of many differing kinds).

Trick is, like everything else, to get the snails from a dealer who you trust, and are identified as Cana or Brig (or other, there's a few others). If you get a 'mystery snail' or an 'apple snail', you're tossing coins and hoping for good luck.

 

[CoryDoc]

Here are my Brig Jade and Brown Striped Snails. I spend hours watching all my snails (about 40).

Jade Snail



And here is my tanks, notice all the live health plants.



Snail Tank

 

[Bloo]

But flumpit2 also wants snails that will turn the substrate over - no Apple snails is going to burrow around like MTS does......

 

[soritan]

Yeah, I agree, I was simply tossing in my penny's worth of info about apple snails, is all. I sort of like brigs, I think they're a bit fascinating. I also have MTSes in my tank, however my sandy substrate is so coarse that they simply do not burrow.

 

[Silentking]

soritan u seem to know ur far share about apple snail. i hear about how once they start to grow u can get rid of them. now on the other i'm trying to breed them and its just not working do u know of anything that can help me

 

[soritan]

Only what I've read at www.applesnail.net

I've been to a few other sites, but frankly they all reiterate the info that applesnail.net has. I haven't bred applesnails yet, I've only had mine for a few weeks and they're too young to breed at the moment.

I'm just the sort of person who researches a whole lot before getting something new, that's the only reason I sometimes sound knowledgeable.