Best loaches (or other fish) to treat snail infestation?

assassin snails might be better way to go, they wont out grow a 55g and you could keep a couple in the 10g, and they dont reproduce anywhere near as much/as fast as the "pest snails" from what i read
 
If by "dwarf loach" you are referring to Y. sudthimunki then yes they are not very common, are rather expensive, and are not great snail eaters.


Yep. Thats what I was looking for. You could probably keep a school of them in your 55 and transfer them in and out of your tanks if you have problems.

Althought I do agree that don't get a fish just to use it just to care of a pest problem. Especailly when it comes to algae, people get plecos that grow massively and they just end up being tank busters and algae eaters. So, research.
 
A chanchito or two would clean them out, I toss extra ramshorns into their growout tank by the handful. Nothing left but empty shells.
 
assassin snails might be better way to go, they wont out grow a 55g and you could keep a couple in the 10g, and they dont reproduce anywhere near as much/as fast as the "pest snails" from what i read

The thing is, they don't produce as fast but they also don't eat as much as you anticipate them to eat.
 
I have 8 Y. sidthimunki in my 55G and they don't bother the snails too much. It could also be because I feed them well. They may go after the snails if they were hungrier. I think the price for them is around $10-12 a piece if you can find them. Now, clown loaches are a different story, but I wouldn't keep them in a 55G.

I have two assassin snails in a 75G, and they eat about a 6-10 rams horns snails a week. They won't go after those really tiny flat ramshorn about double the size of a pin head, though.
 
I went to two of my local LFS but I only found a pair of kuhlii loaches and a pair of zebra loaches, so I took the zebras and put them in the 55g. There's a store about 15 miles from me that has dwarf loaches, so I'll go tomorrow to pick some up. How many should I get? Would these outgrow the tank?

And what's a chanchito? XD Never heard of them.

Snail eating is an essential role for the fish, but I'll also love them and care for them like my other lazy job-less ornamental fish :P
 
I know you're going the fish control route, but I just wanted to put another plug in for manual removal of snails. Even if they're coating the glass, it's totally doable. Just take a net and sweep from the bottom to the top along the glass. The net catches them, and you pull them out. You can get half the population in the tank in less than two minutes. If you do that daily, in a week the population is minimal. Something to keep in mind if the fish don't live up to your expectations.
 
the LFS sold me a fish that they said would eat the small snails and it was BS it never ate one, once you get those little snails you will never get rid of them
maybe you could put your fish in a QT tank and add something to kill them
that may work

snails are the main reason i went with fake plants this time
 
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