Can livebearing fish (mollies, platy, swordtails, guppies), and red eye tetra live with a snail in the tank...or I should say can a snail live with those fish in the tank haha. I have one molly who is the bully of the tank so I'm afraid about that fish with the snail. Also in the future in that tank I might want some type of gourami or angelfish or rosybarbs, or mountain minnows...any future problem with these and the snail? The snail (mystery) is at or alittle over marble size i guess. Also do they eat plants? I can't remember and its too late in the night for me to want to go look it up haha. Oh also what about small plecos with snails..safe to do?
Snail Tankmates
- Thread starter NewLuv4Fish
- Start date
No problems for the snails with the fish you mentioned.... except that the Angelfish like a little salt...not great for snails, and the mountain minnows are cool water fish, though they can survive in warmer tanks. Depends on how they were raised. Snails like warmer water, they go dormant around 65 degrees and die if the water is colder.
i know many many breeders who dont use salt. i dont think salt is needed.
the snails should be fine.
Well, I've never kept Angels, but I do read a lot. A lot of what I have read says salt. :huh: Can all the resources be wrong?
ToddnBecka and Mgamer, I stand corrected. My information was old. After I posted my last response, I checked the Internet again for information. Apparently, salt and Angelfish was a practice from the past that has since been changed. Thanks for being persistent.
This is actually not true of Mollies.
Certain species of Mollies like salt, others like brackish and other like freshwater.
The common misconception comes from the most common species of Mollies been sold favouring brackish or salty water....
Certain species of Mollies like salt, others like brackish and other like freshwater.
The common misconception comes from the most common species of Mollies been sold favouring brackish or salty water....
Mollies are tolerant of salt, I've even seen them kept in full SW tanks at the lfs after being acclimated. It isn't necessary though, they will also live and breed just fine in FW. The main thing is pH, they definitely do best in alkaline (and generally hard) water.
Ok so back to snails haha. Salt will kill them huh? Good to know, glad I didn't have any in the livebearer tank! The only reason I didn't have some salt in there is because of the tetra.
OK, lets clear up the Mollie thing.
Mollies do not prefer salt in itself, rather they prefer the water conditions that come along with it.
Mollies prefer very clean water, no nitrite, very little nitrate (levels as much as 5ppm may be too much for them). The prefer warm, hard and alkaline water.
Marine Salt mix can provide ideal conditions for Mollie, hence they're 'tolerance' of salty water. Because some are found wild in brackish they are still happy in perhaps full seawater.
Tonic salt is useless for Mollies, other than it can help protect them from Nitrites.
So, in summary, Mollies are harder to keep than people think, but marine salt can help.