Mystery snail question: did it die?

pull them out and smell them, you will be able to tell real quick if they are alive or not! :eek3:

Wait, you are treating the tank with salt, but you didn't take out the snail? You do know what happens when you put salt on a snail, right? Why take the chance? You could have put them in another tank for the time being. But, yea, take the snails out and smell them, they should smell really rancid. Or, when you poke them they should close up their trapdoor. Try taking them out and and trying to pull the trapdoor open a bit. If it closes right back up, the snail is alive. If not, it's dead.

Wat2Go said:

Two of my mystery snails started floating yesterday (in two different tanks). One is in the 55 gallon (which has salt in it as I am treating for ich) and one in a 10 gallon. Sometimes they sink, but most of the time they simply float near the surface. No action in any which way for two days now. In one of the snails the door is shut completely, the other has its door open slightly, and when I touch it nothing happens.
Should I assume they died?

L.

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Immediately get any snail out of water that has had aquarium salt added! I have a frog showing signs of dropsy, so I immediately separated him into my 10 gallon that only had my mystery snail in it. I then proceeded to treat the water with Maroxy and salt. Life is busy right now, so it took me a day and a half to realize my snail wasn't moving around at all, not even to hide from my frog. Slowly it dawned on me about the salt, and I immediately transfered the snail to my cherry shrimp tank. After a few minutes, he was over on top of a piece of lettuce I had in there! I'm sure I got him out just in time! Good luck!
barthur

Take the snail out of salt like other said... It might well be fine snails can live along time in a dormant dead like state in their shells floating and then often if they dont' die first will when the water quality gets better return to their old selves...
Dont' assume they have died just because they are floating...(unless there are other signs such as no snail in the shell, dead odor etc...)
Do a tank cleaning and water change with some Prime and your snails may well be just fine in a day or two.

:: rolls eyes::

relax, people. pouring salt onto a slug in the garden is NOT the same as dissolving salt into water and then adding it to your tank where a snail lives. dissovled salt in water is not going to damage or melt your snail. occasionally, after a good feeding, snails will do exactly what the OP has described - hunker down into their shells and chill. they float because they have pockets in their shells that contain the air that they breathe. they could possibly be dead. . . . . but if they are, it is not because of the salt in the water. having two snails in different tanks doing this at the same time says that it is a different factor that is common to them both. food, recent water change, temperature fluctuation, etc. . . .

Snails float, salt, no salt, I have treated tanks with ich, with snails, and its not going to kill the snail, unless your pouring it directly on it..