odd snail behaviors

M

maaltan

AC Members
Sep 11, 2004
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I have magic pond snails. Have you ever noticed your snails walking on water .. or more correctly under the surface skating on the surface tension? I can tap my tank and about 3-5 snail will fall from the tension.

Also, are baby, just hatched, snails freeswimming? The reason I ask this is because i was trying to breed ghost shrimp in my hospital tank just to see if i could (well I couldnt' they all died but they lasted 3 months. longest ive ever seen them live.) I put about 3-5 snails in there to clean up some of the algae. Next morning it was almost all gone and there were about 20-50 egg sacks all over the java moss.

Well all the ghost shrimp are dead and i've just been letting my java moss grow to sell/ stock friends tanks with and ive noticed about a million little "bugs" little white specks. they move around the glass like snails but every once in a while they will jump off the glass and maneuver themselves to a better position its not just moving with the current either. ive seen them move against it and to a stem of moss .. also sometimes it looks like they are scurrying around the substrate like some saltwater scuds ive seen at my LFS's reef tank. also the water has gone very milky which is probably not related

keep in mind its been about 3 weeks since the last ghost shrimp died. I never saw eggs on any of them. and i did a 99% water change after they died and changed filter floss.

so are my snails flying or do i have baby shrimp?
 
Snails can and do "walk" on the underside of the surface tension of the water. The common tank snaills are air-breathers and do go to the surface for air regularly.

The little things moving around could be baby ghost shrimp, but may more likely be tiny copepods or comparable small crustaceans - there are plenty of FW forms of these, just as there are SW. We don't see them much as the fish eat them. Your Java Moss is the perfect habitat for them, or for baby Ghost shrimp if that is what they are.
 
My snails go up to the surface and float around. Cool sight the other night...3 of them were on the underside of duckweed floating in the surface, going in a circle in the filter return current, looked like they were riding an upside down merry-go round! :D
 
RTR said:
Snails can and do "walk" on the underside of the surface tension of the water. The common tank snaills are air-breathers and do go to the surface for air regularly.

The little things moving around could be baby ghost shrimp, but may more likely be tiny copepods or comparable small crustaceans - there are plenty of FW forms of these, just as there are SW. We don't see them much as the fish eat them. Your Java Moss is the perfect habitat for them, or for baby Ghost shrimp if that is what they are.
Click to expand...

hmm cool I have no idea where they have come from though. i have never seen them in the main tank and thats where the java moss came from. need to find me a microscope.

i was thinking of trying to get a micro crustacean colony started for live food etc. so if they already exist good.
 
ooh got some worm like things on the glass now .. might be planeria but i cant see them that well. They appear to be .01mm to 3 MM long white worms that appear round the best i can tell and dont appear to have a head like planeria .. but like i said they are tiny, i have some sort of spots on the glass (like hard water, type stuff. but vinegar doesn't touch it) and i cant find my microscope.

not mosquito larvae either .. and i dont know how they would have gotten in there and I am alergic-ish to mosquito bites.not deadly, just itchy for weeks and a 3-5 inch welk. So i would have known if a mosquito is in here. I also have cats that love to eat flies and any other bugs that wander through. afraid of mice though .. eeh i just train my swordtails for that job.

the little "swimmers" i mentioned before APPEAR to be (again they tiny) to be roughly flea shaped except they are white.

i was getting ready to break the tank down because it was appeared to be crashing from the loss of the shrimp (white cloudy water, mass explosion of snails, a strange smell) but these tiny things are interesting. I need a good long focal length compound magnifier (bout 1-2ft at 10x=20x would be nice, any suggestions) so i can view this life and look incredibly geeky at same time ;) j/k..

of course i dont want to get anything going in there that could infect me or any of my animals either. so if any of this stuff sounds scary to you yell.
 
nursie said:
My snails go up to the surface and float around. Cool sight the other night...3 of them were on the underside of duckweed floating in the surface, going in a circle in the filter return current, looked like they were riding an upside down merry-go round! :D
Click to expand...

He he, I once watched one on a piece of broken Hygro leaf get pushed around the surface and when it hit the inlet of the AC200, it would get pulled under and spin and flip...looked like an aerial snowboarder. It did this 3 times before getting stuck in the corner. 'Course, once I tried to move it back to the current so the family could see, it dropped off.
 
the little swimmers appear to be small clear-ish football shaped things with dark bands or spots along the "back". i think i can see some very short feelers coming from the "head". Im just using a magnifying glass so it still unclear.

they don't really look like copepods. I think they may be daphnea, but the description says they swim with jerky movements. these are swimming smoothly in sweeping motions. i would have to guess that the average size is less that 1/64" - 1/128"

the "worms" are white round shaped. They move like earth worms. when touched they contract to small ball or bundle. they are about 1/8"-1/4" long and about the same average diameter as the above bugs.
 
the little swimmers appear to be small clear-ish football shaped things with dark bands or spots along the "back". i think i can see some very short feelers coming from the "head". Im just using a magnifying glass so it still unclear.

they don't really look like copepods. I think they may be daphnea, but the description says they swim with jerky movements. these are swimming smoothly in sweeping motions. i would have to guess that the average size is less that 1/64" - 1/128"

the "worms" are white round shaped. They move like earth worms. when touched they contract to small ball or bundle. they are about 1/8"-1/4" long and about the same average diameter as the above bugs.
 
ok .. my magic snails are back .. ok we have established they will crawl on surface tension .. but do yours swim?

I just saw one take off, slowly float to the surface (fully out, still undulating like they were against the glass as if it was actually traveling up a steep ramp to the surface) took about minute and a half to get to surface. then it twisted around and glued to the surface tension .. ok im wierded out. I dont know if i can feed these snails to the puffers (when i get them). i think i have an alien intellegent species. since new tank is beside my computer, im waiting for them to correct my spelling.
 
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