All u can eat snail buffett?

[Bugman]

I may be buying a used tank but it has 100-200 small snails in it. It's about a 40 gl tank. I was wondering if I get it if I could buy snail eating fish and let them have fun. I'm not sure if it would be harmful to the fish. If not what fish would you suggest? I would like to eventually but my 5" green severum in this tank.

[snakeskinner]

PUFFERS!!!!! they are amazing to watch tear apart a snail and they need the shells to help them maintain their teeth/beak. Some loaches will also eat snails but not sure how good/bad they are for them. Most puffers are brackish or saltwater but there are a couple freshwater like dwarf puffers (those may be the only ones, not sure). I believe the brackish board is where most of the puffer experts are at. there are also several websites that are puffer only sites with gobbs of info. kyle

[snakeskinner]

almost forgot, what type of snails these are makes a big difference. If they are trumpet snails, their shells are too hard and they'll damage the puffers and probably the loaches as well. soft shelled snails like pondsnails, mystery snails or ramshorns are what you need for the puffers at least. If you can smash them with your finger, they're probably ok. Kyle

[OrionGirl]

Kuhli loaches are great at eating snails--they don't break the shells, just suck them out of the shell.

Of course--you'll probably be better off just removing everything from the tank and starting over. If there are tons of snails, it means there is a lot of excess nutrients in the tank, and you'll be hard pressed to get the substrate clean enough to prevent the snails from overpopulating again. Combine that with the potential for water condition problems and diseases, and IMO it's not worth the risk. I'd dump everything out, clean the tank with hot water and oxyclean, and start fresh with a complete cycle.

[Bugman]

I think I will clean it all out before and not mess with the snails. I really don't like puffers and don't want to get stuck with them. Some one said firemouths will eat them but it would be to much of a pain to set up-tear down-set up. I just thought it would be cool to watch fish just tear into the snails:p

[daveedka]

I'm with OG on the cleanup while it's easy idea, If you like the idea of a snail eater and snails it isn't too difficult to achieve a snail population after you set up the tank. Firemouths will not only eat them but they are very entertaining to watch when they hunt them.I have a 3/4" firemouth I've had for only a couple of weeks, previous to his introduction I had a huge population of snails, it took him less than two days to make snails hard to find, and after a week you had to really hunt for a long time to know if there were still snails in the tank. I've been told that the firemouth will erradicate all of the snails given time and from what I have seen so far I have little doubt of this.