Ugh, pond snails.

F

Fome

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Dec 1, 2004
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Ok, I've heard multiple sides about these guys, are they bad in a planted aquarium or not? I've heard that they destroy plants and I've heard that they don't touch them.

Right now I only have about 4-5 of the little buggers, they don't seem to harm my plants but who knows. Should I kill them now while they're at a manageable and harmless population or wait and see? I also have 6-7 malaysian trumpet snails and 1 medium apple/ramshorn snail.

new 10g tank, 2.5 wpg, diy co2, lotsa plants, laterite substrate
 
Pond snails are plant harmless, as are MTS's and comon Ramshorns. Apple snails are not plant harmless, and will cause you trouble at some point. Whether or not you keep the pond snails in there is you call, but I don't have any tanks without them except the cichlid tank for obvious reasons. I like the little buggers a lot.
dave
 
I prefer not to have them since they multiply like crazy, but I own puffer fish and i breed these snails for the puffers food...
 
Yeah, Fome, if you don't want those snails to get out of control pick the ones out that you can and put a couple of dwarf puffers in there to eat up any more baby snails that might come along. Snails...that's the reason I will only use silk plants in my tanks, I don't want ANY snails. Well, the fact that I am really good at killing all sorts of plants might have something to do with that too. I figure if I can kill a cactus (a CACTUS!) aquatic plants don't stand a chance with me. :(
 
I'm having trouble identifying my big snail. What distinguishes between an apple snail and a ramshorn snail?

He's a dark brown and likes to hang around my co2 bubbler, lobelia, and microsword. I rather like him, but he's suspect to eating all of my bacopa leaves.
and i'm not too worried about the pond snails ballooning out of control, as far as I see it, they can only populate as much as there's food for them to do so. I'll be having a pretty heavy clean-up crew (2-3 otos accompanied by a few amano shrimp in a 10g) and i don't plan on feeding too much so shouldn't be a problem unless they decide to munch my plants... which I'm worried about.
 
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A common or red ramshorn will max out at about 3/4"- 1", Apple snails will max out close to the size of a baseball. the easy clue would be that in a few weeks you will have more than one if it is a ramshorn. With Ramshorn, pond snails, and MTS's it doesn't take two to tango so to speak. Apple snails and mystery snails get larger, and their shells are wider accross, and they need a mate to reproduce.

One of the reasons for the beleif that pond snails will eat yourplants is the almost the instant a leaf dies or starts to die, almost any snail will begin cleaning it up. So you have healthy appearing leaves one day, and the next day you have a partially eaten leaf witha snail sitting on it.

Either way you will want to find out what your big snial is and act accordingly. It could be an apple snail eating your plants, or it could be a ramshorn cleaning up quickly.
Dave
 
If you want to keep the snails at a manageable level, my Hillstream Loach has been gobbling up the snail eggs on the glass in my tank and I've not seen any pond snails besides the existing ones since I put him in there.
 
I've got ramshorns and a pond snail - little plant hitchikers - in my 10g planted. They do a great job cleaning up the algae from plant leaves. They've laid eggs, but I think my barbs may be eating those, as the egg packets seem to disappear overnight and I never see baby snails.
I've also got an apple snail, who I adore. She's very well behaved :D. Some species of apple/mystery snail go after plants, but Pomacea bridgsii generally leave them alone unless they're very hungry.
Generally speaking, I think snails are beneficial for a tank. As long as you don't overfeed, they shouldn't overmultiply. If they do, little ones make great fish snacks ;)
 
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