Best Algae-Eating Inverts...?

[Kyohti]

I'm planning a 5-gallon planted tank, so I purchased some slow-growing anubias specimens. They can keep leaved for over a year, so algae growth can be problematic. I can't exactly toss a pleco in there so I was thinking perhaps a set of shrimp or a snail. Any advice?

Tank Stats: 5 gallon mini bow, gravel substrate, planted (anubias coffe, anubias petite, crypt wenditii, flame moss, Maylasian driftwood, ornamental rocks), 1 crowntail betta, 4 neon tetras, pH: 6.8.

The betta is highly valuable to me, so I cannot abide by anything nipping or damaging it's finnage (I've hearf ghost shrimp do this?)

 

[J double R]

i find pond snails to be very useful in my fishless 29g.

 

[Kyohti]

What kind of pond snail?

 

[fishcatch22]

olive nerite snails are the bety algae eaters I have ever seen. period. i'd get 3 for your tank.

 

[Kyohti]

I'm so lost! The only snails I've ever heard of were apple snails, ramshorn, and mystery snails... o__O;;

 

[J double R]

the little black ones that are about the size of a pea when grown, and come on most ordered plants.

 

[Kyohti]

I think we have those growing wild in our ditch at my apartment... Is that possible?

 

[TipStylez]

Try to get nerite snails. Pond snails will spread like crazy.

Or ammano shrimps.

I have a 5gal nano myself and i would use the nerites...but i have sand. They dont do so well in sand.

 

[toddnbecka]

Pond snails will only reproduce according to the available food supply. If you don't overfeed the tank, they won't run amok.

 

[toddnbecka]

Another option would be a single or pair of Asolene spixi apple snails. They don't eat live plants, and lay eggs below the water line, unlike other apple snails. They also eat nearly all their own eggs, as well as the eggs of other snail species, so they reproduce relatively slowly.