View Full Version : Stuff in Hornwort
Forget about my unsuccessful attempt at taking a photograph of some fish. I have some hornwort in my new tank, and some parts of it are full of small knobs, like on the bottom of the photograph. Sometimes they are like pearls on a string. Is this normal with hornwort? Is it just dead twigs? Something else? I don't see colors very well, so I'm not really able to tell if it's dead.
http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y234/Turjan/Hornwort.jpg
plah831
09-27-2006, 3:41 PM
my first guess is that they're eggs, most likely snail eggs. But the thing in the photo looks odd, more like fungus or even a peacock feather :huh:
I would just cut that part off, if you're worried. It won't do the plant any harm, and just discard the odd part.
Snails? I already saw one, most probably a trumpet snail, though still a bit small to tell. If those knobs are snail eggs, I will be the happy owner of a hundred snails soon :eek:. I should probably remove the stuff. If it's fungus, that will be even more reason to remove it.
The hornwort grows like a champion, anyway. Sometimes it's two to three inches a day. Even if I remove half of it, it will not be a big loss.
plah831
09-27-2006, 7:13 PM
that's the spirit! :)
jm1212
09-27-2006, 7:19 PM
i would just take off the leaf and then get rid of it
Okay, I have now removed roughly half of all hornwort in the tank. I also discovered a few more snails in the aquarium than yesterday. And they are growing. Quickly. Let's hope that the removal of the hornwort will slow that increase in the snail population down.
plah831
09-28-2006, 7:18 PM
the best way to slow snail population growth is to avoid overfeeding and keep your tank clean. I put a few snails in my community tank to feed my loaches. They let a majority of them get away (or the snails wisened up and kept to the decorations and off the substrate). Now, over two months later I still only have a handful of snails. I see a few babies, but I can say the snails are definitely not a "problem". I also do 50% water change once a week, as well as small (25% ish) WC's twice during the week, for a total of 3 water changes weekly in my big tank. So basically the best way to stem their numbers is to keep up with your tank maintenance and avoid leftover food on which they thrive :)
I'll try to heed that advice. At the moment, the snails live nearly exclusively on the glass, though. There is some algae growth (hardly noticeable), but I didn't do much about it because the guppies liked it. Perhaps, I just clean the windows.
plah831
09-28-2006, 7:46 PM
well, if your snails are presenting themselves on the glass a lot (which mine don't for some reason), you could just use something to scrape them off. Then crush them and throw them away. I recommend killing them first because it's always possible for them to escape and maybe even establish a breeding population somewhere they're not supposed to be, like in your plumbing ;)