Snails Mysterious Behaviour - OK or harmful?

[NeonJulie]

I have (2) Olive Nerita snails that have been in the tank for 2 weeks. Well, this is like the 5th time I've found one stuck to the shell of the other one. Is it trying to eat the other one? Is it harmful? Normal? Can snails kill eachother?

Thanks... weird I know, but I wonder!

[petluvr]

Don't know about the nerites but it is normal behavior in Briggs to do this. MATING....

[KIM_TMA]

This can be viewed 2 different ways. Do you have enough algae in this tank to sustain both of them. They ONLY eat algae nothing else. They seem to really like the Green Spot Algae too.
If you don't have enough algae in your tank this maybe the reason they are on each other, cleaning algae off each others shells.

The other reason would be what petluvr suggested MATING.

I really don't think that they will hurt each other though. I think the snail eating snails are really the only snails that hurt other snails.

[NeonJulie]

Thanks... the mating would be weird/unexpected because I thought I read that it required brackish conditions. (But maybe that's for survival of the babies?)

There is a smorgusboard of algae for the shrimp and two snails... I see brown, green, and dark green. It's been growing for about 2 months before I put them in the tank, so it was pretty established. I held off cleaning any of it so that I could leave it for them, but to be honest, the 4 shrimp and 2 snails haven't been able to keep up, so I helped them out a bit with the algae scraper yesterday...

[petluvr]

Algae scraper the aquarist best friend:) I don't know if they need brackish water to just do the nasty or if they have to have BW to actually lay eggs. Where's Jinkzd when you need her:)

[vampie]

My Olives are always all over one another. It's harmless.

And they do not eat only algae. Mine feeds on pellets and wafers like other snails.

[msjinkzd]

They will lay eggs in fw, they eggs just won't hatch so its very likely they are mating or grooming each other. I also supplement mine with algae wafers and veggies.

[NeonJulie]

Well... It's been a LONG day for them then. *LOL*

Thanks for everyone's feedback... (I'm curious too if the pile of shrimp going on today is a similar reason...)

[Mgamer20o0]

they do that lol

[thebullit]

sounds normal behavour to me.