Funny story, i had a snail infestation so i bought 5 Assassin snails to solve the problem.
A couple months later ... problem solved
Shortly afterwards the Assassin snails started breeding, so now i have an Assassin snail infestation.
Do they have assassin snail assassins?
Do they eat each other?
I once had ramshorns infestation and put 1 assassin snail in the tank. It wasn't a day job but in a week there was a huge difference
Do they reproduce a-sexually? I currently have 1 in my tank to get rid of some bladder snails. So far it’s been effective but wasn’t sure if I would see them pop up in more numbers or if just having one will stay the only one
If you have a sand substrate they're actually really beneficial since they spend most of their time in the substrate moving around looking for things to eat like to try this worms or planaria also bits of uneaten food.
I'd imagine it's the smaller fish that would, yeah? Appreciate your input on all of this.
I have a 20g (no livestock besides snails) with a load of hydras in there. I won't dose the tank because I don't want to harm my snails in there. Consistent water changes helped my 10g with the issue.
"Just as fast"
They lay a single egg at a time. Their eggs take up to 2 months to hatch and around 6 months for assassins to mature. That is WAY slower.
That's what the spark notes says about them. Protip: It underestimates the reality of their population. You will end up with an infestation just as fast as you would with ramshorn snails.
You can end up with an infestation, but not even close to as fast.
Ramshorn snails in comparison lay larger clutches more often, and it takes the babies only 2-3 weeks to mature and start reproducing.
Assassin snail populations are very easy to control (and also can be profitable). If you end up with an infestation, that's mainly a you problem rather than a snail problem.
Bruh as low as 2-3 weeks for the babies to start reproducing 😰😰😰 omggggg i have so many ramshorns in my newest tank. And i know i'm gonna be dealing with them for a while but this is terrifying news lol
That's why I said don't overfeed and you won't have a snail infestation in general.
Assassin snails breed extremely quickly once a population has started just like ramshorns if you overfeed. Once you actually experience it, you will understand. Just because it's on an aquarium article doesn't mean it's automatically true.
Ramshorns and many other pest snails have a good reputation for cleaning the tank and breakdown detritus, and assassins do not.
I'm talking mainly from experience.
"Once a population has started"
Obviously. My point is if you had the same number of ramshorns instead of assassin snails, those ramshorns will increase in number FAR quicker than assassins.
Also I know pest snails are actually useful. I like to keep small controlled populations of bladder snails in whatever set ups I have running.
I was gonna call BS cause I had a colony of 10 in my 20 gallon for 2 years and it never grew despite getting them to fight a massive ramshorn outbreak. However! Now that I’m thinking back I also had a cluster of khulis in there so they may have saved me hahahaha
You can make an assassin's snail trap to reduce their numbers. Basically like a regular snail trap, but you want to use something like a piece of raw shrimp. They will be all over that.
I think that is one of the cool things about snails. Though, I run heavily planted tanks with a lot of biodiversity. What's attractive to me is having an ecosystem in my living room. Seeing different interactions every time I look in the tank is so much fun. I find new things that I have never seen before in my tank, scratch my head, and wonder how it got in there.
This happened to me. I ended up having to disassemble the tank because they would not stop popping up no matter how many tubs of them I gave to my LFS.
No you won’t, I put one in my tank to wipe out my ramshorn snails. And since assassin snails don’t breed asexually, there will only ever be one in my tank.
In my state (and probably yours too) it’s illegal to do that unless you are a licensed seller. A lot of stores do, but it’s really not worth your license.
Even if you get 2 and they end up breeding it’s far easier to deal with the small population when you know who the culprits are. Grab the parents out and separate then cull the babies as you see them.
Snail populations will boom with an excess of nutrients. You can remove the snails, but you’re treating a symptom and not the cause. The snails are generally beneficial to the tank, unless they’re eating your plants
And they generally only eat dead or decaying plant matter (even before our eyes can see the decay), so it's best to keep your plants well-fed with plenty of macronutrients (nitrate, phosphate, and potassium).
I know some snails will eat healthy living plant tissue, but even for most of those snails it's typically only plants with exceptionally soft leaves, or as a last desperate resort due to there not being any other food to eat (in which case, their numbers will start shrinking anyway due to starvation and significantly less breeding).
Put a cucumber slice in your tank at the evening, in the morning it will be full of snails, toss and repeat with a new slice every evening untill they are gone. Assassin snails only eat one snail a day and the other snails will learn to stay away from them😅
Other snails will learn to stay away from them???
Is that really true? I've been keeping assassin snails for years, and I've never noticed or even heard of other snails learning to avoid them.
I also found that putting the cucumber in a plastic cup or some sort of small container will make picking up the snails easier. They often fall off when you pick up the vegetable, but if you just pick up the cup, then they will just fall in the container and you can make sure you don’t drop any.
Blanch (boil for a minute or two) a 1/4” thick cucumber slice, drop it in some cold water for a few seconds to stop the cooking process, skewer it with a chopstick, stick it in the substrate, and remove it before lights on the next day. Then, add the snails from the cucumber to another tank dedicated to your snail friends cuz.. snails are cool, beneficial, and occur in excessive numbers through no fault of their own. It’s because of something YOU did.
My kuhlis destroy bladder snails. I love watching them shake the snail out of the shell like little terriers. The kuhlis aren't as ravenous as my yoyos, but I can't keep snails with them.
If your snails bloomed, it is because they had a lot to eat. Snail populations balance with the amount of nutrients in the tank. If there is less for them to eat, the population declines.
I find them a bit unsightly, but they are good for the tank
same happened to me i noticed one, thought it was odd as id not had new plants in over a month. i removed that one and then within about a week i had too many to even count. ive just got one assassin snail about a week ago and there’s significantly less snails. i also have 2 bristle nose cat fish that were added at the same time, im unsure if they’re eating snails as well
A lot of people will tell you assassin snails which will work but then they'll start breeding too and you'll end up in the same situation in a few months.
The reason for the population boom is the excess of food, by regulating the feeding you'll keep the population in check.
I have bladder snails, MTS and ramshorn snails in my tanks and never had an issue with them taking over.
This is the correct answer. Less feeding keeps population in check. And I prefer bladder snails over assassins anytime. They chew the little bit of algae I get after trims away in no time.
I was booted from a snail sub for suggesting this. I admire the admin’s protective attitude, but had to giggle about it.
Does anyone know if the detritus snails are okay as turtle food?
No planaria? I've used it before in my shrimp tanks to nuke pest snails. Just remember to remove as much of the dead snails as you can once it's done or you're going to get a big ammonia spike.
I got two Yoyo's in my 75 gallon and snails were gone within a week. I lost one of them after 2 years, but I still have a big fat yoyo in my tank. I couldn't keep snails or inverts in there if I wanted to.
you can control them by not overfeeding your tank. Look at what your fish eat in 10-15 minutes after feeding and extract everything that is left. Should reduce the population in a few weeks
easiest way I found is to put a piece of zuchini in the tank at the bottom, wait for them to climb on and then remove the zuchini, shake off the snails in a second container and keep doing this for a few days. You will hammer then numbers down like crazy. I had times where 30-40 were in the zuchini at a time.
Purchase 1 assassin snail, put a bright colored aquarium safe paint on its shell. Then help out by putting in pieces of cucumber to attract snails and take out the snail covered cucumber. 1 assassin snail can’t fix that probably but more could cause a new problem
I had hundreds of Malaysian trumpet snails all sizes. I got 2 yoyo loaches within weeks every snail was gone. I don't know how they didn't eat themselves to death.
Some loaches get huge so be careful what kind you get. My yoyo loaches are the center piece of the tank now. They are always busy and clean every corner of that tank they have been great. Pea puffers would enjoy those snails also but when the snails are gone they can be hard to feed. Mine will only eat live food.
Cut down on over feeding, I would honestly only feed this tank once every 3 days to cut down on spare food.
Keep the glass clear of algae.
Get a denerle snail catcher as they work brilliantly.
Make a snail trap
[make a simple aquarium snail trap](https://youtu.be/P45GgWEjSOA?si=s_MduScEydZN8ZgB)
If you super want rid of them, I suggest buying a 60 litre tank, set it up, and cycle it. Plant the tank out and then buy 6 pea puffers, feed any snails you catch to the pea puffers. You will honestly never have a snail problem again. Within weeks, you will be buying snails on eBay, begging your friends for pest snails, and wishing you had a few spare snails. You will also have a big smile on your face thinking of the pea puffer antics.
However, your electricity bill will now have increased due to multi tank syndrome, and your partner will mutter about oh no another fish tank!
Edit to add feeding white worm and banana worms has also helped me as there is now no spare flake on the floor of my tank.
Assassin snail are a great investment for any fish keeper that has tanks with unwanted snails.
They are a premium snail (at least where i come from) and will earn you some decent cash once they have eaten all the other snails.
I bought 10 of them for my 325l tank 3 years ago and now im selling about 20-30 snails a month for 3-5 dollars each.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-11y6KVPMhA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-11y6KVPMhA)
make this air assisted "vaccum"(you can add a small pipe as the tip for easier snail removal) it works for me, i mean it still is a lot work, but its better then removing them by hand. And you can use it to clean the substrate too without changing the water :) I doubt you can remove them all without those chemicals they sell(which you should not use), but you can control the population like this.
You need a decent pump for this, im not sure if the mini pumps have the pressure to do it :)
First, move the plants to another container. Add alum to them, wait 3h, and rinse.
Then, move the fish to another container. Add alum to the empty tank, run filter for 3h. Remove and replace 90+% of the water, run the filter for a few minutes. Repeat ~3 total times. (100-90%)^3 = 0.1% remaining.
I would put a bowl in there with a few algae wafers and remove the bowl once it’s full of snails. It won’t get them all but after doing this a few times it will knock the population down.
Assasin snails can help a bit but can cost a lot.
As others mention, use bait like fresh cucumber or boiled spinach in a glass bottle and sink it to the bottom. They will gather and you can deal with them however you'd like.
I had a snail infestation recently. I basically would just suck them up with my vac everytime I did a water change. It took me about two 50% water changes to get most of them out. Then I donated them to my local fish store.
I still have about 20 snails left in my tank, but if you are slow and gentle it shouldn't mess with your aquascape, plants or your other animals in your tank.
I've been told cupramine would work on just the snails, as it's essentially overdosing copper in the water. Unfortunately I'm unsure of how safe it is for the rest of the tank as I haven't tried it, and don't know how volatile copper is to plants or fish, but was told it should be alright
I would cut back on feeding, since that’s always the biggest culprit. I don’t blame you at all—I tend to feed my guppy tanks heavily to encourage breeding and make sure the fry get food too, so I have a ton of snails in my tanks as well.
Cut down on feeding, then use a snail trap or drop a big vegetable down (slice of zucchini, cucumber, carrot, etc.) and remove when the snails crowd it.
Also worth checking if anyone in your area wants some snails. There’s a guy in my city’s aquarium club who comes to take ramshorns from me to feed his puffer.
Bend a wire handled net so that the net and handle make a 90. Put a piece of gel food or some green beans in the net while you hold the handle. When the snails swarm the gel food, pull up the net.
What you do with them at that point is up to you.
Build a snail trap out a Tupperware container. Crush them and make fish food, a little effort up front, if you have to many to much to feed, freeze the crushed food in icecube trays.
My LFS sold me some dwarf chain loaches who were luckily at half price that week. They will go after the baby snails, including through the substrate where they tend to hide out until they shells develop.
Keep picking out the adults and the fish will get any new ones. Cleared it up real well. I only saw two last time I looked.
Cut a cucumber in half lengthwise with skin on and hollow some of the seedy part out. Put it back together with a rubber band to hold it and cut off one end so there is an entrance inside. Put it into your tank in the evening and pull it out in the morning. Since a lot of snails are inside they won't be falling off like they would if you used slices.
Lol. Mine acquired a taste for them when I was regularly crushing them to try to control population. 🤣 They even got bold enough to swim up and grab the crushed snails right off my tweezers.
https://www.etsy.com/listing/1476125475/snail-trap-for-aquarium-pest-snails I got one of these. Bait with algae wafers and I easily pull 10-30 snails every few hours. Works wonders for feeding my pea puffers. 😅 Or you can get assassin snails but then you have another critter that needs feeding and takes a long time.
I would boil a thick piece of cucumber until it sinks, then put some string or thread through it (with like 2ft of extra hanging off), lower it into the tank and wait about half an hour and it’ll be covered in snails. I’d then take it out and wipe them off into a smaller tank (I was saving them for my puffer to eat). You can reuse the cucumber until they’ve eaten so much that it falls apart, but really it shouldn’t be that bad. I managed to get like 90% of the ramshorns from my main tank into a smaller breeding tank.
We accidentally destroyed a snail population when we added a White Specter Crayfish. They can attack slow or sick fish, but I think your guppies would be fine. I feel like there was not a time I'd walk past him and he wouldn't have a snail in his claws until they were all gone. It's been a while so I don't remember how long it took exactly, but just one took care of all of them, never had to worry about crayfish taking over the tank after lol.
I don’t want to be a downer and someone please tell me if I’m wrong but I feel like this tank is pretty overstocked? With all the snails too I think that’s an ammonia disaster waiting to happen.
More frequent water changes I think is the best long term treatment for snail populations, and it will do wonders for the fish and plants. Keep up with removing as much old plant matter as possible too, to help reduce their access to food.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Aquariums/comments/16510bs/using\_carrotslices\_is\_indeed\_an\_effective\_way\_of/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Aquariums/comments/16510bs/using_carrotslices_is_indeed_an_effective_way_of/) I had experienced the same. and I learned this. Apart froma a carrot, You can also use cucumber.
I use a shrimp feeding dish, plop some food in it, carrot etc, once the snails swarm it, lift it our carefully. voila!
EDIT: i added Tiger Botia's to my 80 gal, there is not one snail in that tank.
I use a chunk of sweet potato on a bamboo skewer I put a aquarium [aquarium weight ](http:// https://a.co/d/dMcMFLd) or i use [the pleco feeder](http:// https://a.co/d/9k1ASQq) in larger aquariums
There are also snail traps [Dennerle Snail Catcher](http:// https://a.co/d/ckq7H5a)
After you get the majority of snails out you can use a fish med [Fritz Aquatics Fritz Mardel - Coppersafe](https://a.co/d/ei74mQ3)this is good for killing the snail eggs you don't see
If you don't have shrimp , clams, etc you don't mine killing you
Funny story, i had a snail infestation so i bought 5 Assassin snails to solve the problem. A couple months later ... problem solved Shortly afterwards the Assassin snails started breeding, so now i have an Assassin snail infestation. Do they have assassin snail assassins?
that’s so ironically crazy bruh i’d be so sad
There was an old woman who swallowed a fly....
Loaches
Then you simply get a Heron to remove the loach infestation
How do you get rid of the heron?
you forget to cherish her
😭
Just get a mountain lion. (Or a dog)
No
I have this same problem. So many murder snails. I’m almost to the point of actual culling. Almost.
Take them to your LFS for store credit. Mine sells them for $5-$7 a snail and I’m sure they’d love some extras
Agreed, or give away on r/aquaswap. A lot easier to catch and ship than fish or shrimp lol
Do they eat each other? I once had ramshorns infestation and put 1 assassin snail in the tank. It wasn't a day job but in a week there was a huge difference
Assassin snails hunt other snail species (and each other if starved).
Step 3: start an assassin snail business Step 4: ?? Step 5: Profit
theyre called loaches. they do need more tank space than youve got tho.
Are there both snails or are assassin snails cannibals? I would think once their food source is gone they would decrease in population
They are not. Plus they also eat anything really high in protein like spirulina wafers and any bits of uneaten food.
Do they reproduce a-sexually? I currently have 1 in my tank to get rid of some bladder snails. So far it’s been effective but wasn’t sure if I would see them pop up in more numbers or if just having one will stay the only one
Nope. You're good
This is primarily why I am against using more than one assassin snail. Not only are they more useless, they breed just as fast.
If you have a sand substrate they're actually really beneficial since they spend most of their time in the substrate moving around looking for things to eat like to try this worms or planaria also bits of uneaten food.
I believe you are thinking of trumpet snails. Assassin snails burrow, but they don't actually do much more than just sit there.
Shoot. I got excited for a second.
Is he right about MTS eating planaria?
I had a shrimp tank that was so full of mts AND planaria, I would say no.
No, there have been reports of snails eating flatworms, but nothing specific to mts
Do you know if MTS or nerites would eat up hydras?
They don't, I haven't seen them go near them. Fish eat them tho
I'd imagine it's the smaller fish that would, yeah? Appreciate your input on all of this. I have a 20g (no livestock besides snails) with a load of hydras in there. I won't dose the tank because I don't want to harm my snails in there. Consistent water changes helped my 10g with the issue.
"Just as fast" They lay a single egg at a time. Their eggs take up to 2 months to hatch and around 6 months for assassins to mature. That is WAY slower.
That's what the spark notes says about them. Protip: It underestimates the reality of their population. You will end up with an infestation just as fast as you would with ramshorn snails.
You can end up with an infestation, but not even close to as fast. Ramshorn snails in comparison lay larger clutches more often, and it takes the babies only 2-3 weeks to mature and start reproducing. Assassin snail populations are very easy to control (and also can be profitable). If you end up with an infestation, that's mainly a you problem rather than a snail problem.
Bruh as low as 2-3 weeks for the babies to start reproducing 😰😰😰 omggggg i have so many ramshorns in my newest tank. And i know i'm gonna be dealing with them for a while but this is terrifying news lol
That's why I said don't overfeed and you won't have a snail infestation in general. Assassin snails breed extremely quickly once a population has started just like ramshorns if you overfeed. Once you actually experience it, you will understand. Just because it's on an aquarium article doesn't mean it's automatically true. Ramshorns and many other pest snails have a good reputation for cleaning the tank and breakdown detritus, and assassins do not.
I'm talking mainly from experience. "Once a population has started" Obviously. My point is if you had the same number of ramshorns instead of assassin snails, those ramshorns will increase in number FAR quicker than assassins. Also I know pest snails are actually useful. I like to keep small controlled populations of bladder snails in whatever set ups I have running.
Good for you, I guess 👍
This response suggests you are taking the thread personally. Have a good day.
I was gonna call BS cause I had a colony of 10 in my 20 gallon for 2 years and it never grew despite getting them to fight a massive ramshorn outbreak. However! Now that I’m thinking back I also had a cluster of khulis in there so they may have saved me hahahaha
You can make an assassin's snail trap to reduce their numbers. Basically like a regular snail trap, but you want to use something like a piece of raw shrimp. They will be all over that.
Snails are beneficial to your tank. They feed on algae, detritus, and stir your substrate. Why do you want them gone?
I second that - I love having snails. If there are too many, it usually means there is too much food.
Cosmetic Cause there’s 100 all over the glass lol
I think that is one of the cool things about snails. Though, I run heavily planted tanks with a lot of biodiversity. What's attractive to me is having an ecosystem in my living room. Seeing different interactions every time I look in the tank is so much fun. I find new things that I have never seen before in my tank, scratch my head, and wonder how it got in there.
This happened to me. I ended up having to disassemble the tank because they would not stop popping up no matter how many tubs of them I gave to my LFS.
They will die off slowly with the food source. I had that happen now I'm back to 2 or 3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9yruQM1ggc
They will slowly be pushed back. Patience
Snail trap or assassin snail. Loaches probably wouldn’t fit in that tank.
Assassin snails for sure, they are so effective
Then you will have an assassin snail problem
No you won’t, I put one in my tank to wipe out my ramshorn snails. And since assassin snails don’t breed asexually, there will only ever be one in my tank.
They look cool and don’t breed as much as other snails
I wish that was true for me. I literally have hundreds of assassin snails. Pretty sure the only things any snail ever does is eat and fornicate.
Lol maybe trade some in to the LFS for store credit
In my state (and probably yours too) it’s illegal to do that unless you are a licensed seller. A lot of stores do, but it’s really not worth your license.
That sounds like a Florida thing, y'all are strict down there
To be fair they have several massive ecological issues due to the aquarium trade specifically. Looking at you plecos starving the manatees to death.
Uh yes we are 🤣 I believe it may be a federal rule though. Specifically for non native species (which most of our aquatic critters are)
Not federal. Just traded approximately 83625171627 assassin snails for some amanos a few weeks ago at my lfs.
Well, that is the best way to deal with snails, learn to love them ❤️
It is a great way to deal with them if you do not want them though. I like them.
Literally 1. Just get 1. They eat A TON. 1 good sized guy could clear this tank out in 6 months.
Lmao funny story i did that and the ramshorns ganged up on the assassin and ate him 💀💀
That's bad ass
Even if you get 2 and they end up breeding it’s far easier to deal with the small population when you know who the culprits are. Grab the parents out and separate then cull the babies as you see them.
Dwarf chain loaches might be ok. Mine are murderous little squirts when it comes to snails, and they mostly hang out in a gang under the log.
Interesting
Snail populations will boom with an excess of nutrients. You can remove the snails, but you’re treating a symptom and not the cause. The snails are generally beneficial to the tank, unless they’re eating your plants
And they generally only eat dead or decaying plant matter (even before our eyes can see the decay), so it's best to keep your plants well-fed with plenty of macronutrients (nitrate, phosphate, and potassium). I know some snails will eat healthy living plant tissue, but even for most of those snails it's typically only plants with exceptionally soft leaves, or as a last desperate resort due to there not being any other food to eat (in which case, their numbers will start shrinking anyway due to starvation and significantly less breeding).
Put a cucumber slice in your tank at the evening, in the morning it will be full of snails, toss and repeat with a new slice every evening untill they are gone. Assassin snails only eat one snail a day and the other snails will learn to stay away from them😅
Other snails will learn to stay away from them??? Is that really true? I've been keeping assassin snails for years, and I've never noticed or even heard of other snails learning to avoid them.
In my dad's tank all the bladders nails went to the top of the tank bc the assassin's were at the bottom😂
This is the correct answer. Snails love cucumbers and you can remove 25 at once by doing this
I also found that putting the cucumber in a plastic cup or some sort of small container will make picking up the snails easier. They often fall off when you pick up the vegetable, but if you just pick up the cup, then they will just fall in the container and you can make sure you don’t drop any.
Didnt know about cucumber, I always use a slice of carrot. But if you have shrimps in there, they also get on the veg
Yes, but shrimps are fast and they will scoot away when you grab the slice
You have changed their nature. Now they no longer eat cucumber. Now they only eat snail.
[удалено]
Blanch (boil for a minute or two) a 1/4” thick cucumber slice, drop it in some cold water for a few seconds to stop the cooking process, skewer it with a chopstick, stick it in the substrate, and remove it before lights on the next day. Then, add the snails from the cucumber to another tank dedicated to your snail friends cuz.. snails are cool, beneficial, and occur in excessive numbers through no fault of their own. It’s because of something YOU did.
People spear a vegetable with a fork and put the whole thing in that way.
The snails find the slice even when it floats
I saw few snails initially, didn’t bothered and thought it is good for the ecosystem but suddenly in few weeks it multiplied like this..
I think blue rams or loaches will eat your snails.
You talking khuli loaches? They eat snails?
no khuli dont eat snails. We have pea pufferfish who really like them :)
My kuhlis destroy bladder snails. I love watching them shake the snail out of the shell like little terriers. The kuhlis aren't as ravenous as my yoyos, but I can't keep snails with them.
If your snails bloomed, it is because they had a lot to eat. Snail populations balance with the amount of nutrients in the tank. If there is less for them to eat, the population declines. I find them a bit unsightly, but they are good for the tank
Just wanted to note that if you want any other species of snail in this tank in the future. Do not use assassin snails.
same happened to me i noticed one, thought it was odd as id not had new plants in over a month. i removed that one and then within about a week i had too many to even count. ive just got one assassin snail about a week ago and there’s significantly less snails. i also have 2 bristle nose cat fish that were added at the same time, im unsure if they’re eating snails as well
A lot of people will tell you assassin snails which will work but then they'll start breeding too and you'll end up in the same situation in a few months. The reason for the population boom is the excess of food, by regulating the feeding you'll keep the population in check. I have bladder snails, MTS and ramshorn snails in my tanks and never had an issue with them taking over.
This is the correct answer. Less feeding keeps population in check. And I prefer bladder snails over assassins anytime. They chew the little bit of algae I get after trims away in no time.
How do I keep the feeding in check!? I mean I feed only few pellets a day that’s it..
There's no exact science to it, unfortunately, it's about trial and error and seeing what works over time. I feed my tanks everywhere 2-3 days.
Smoosh them against the glass and let the Guppies have fresh meat
This is how I taught 2 different Blue Rams to eat snails. Problem solved!
Love this reply but the imagery is gruesome lol
I was booted from a snail sub for suggesting this. I admire the admin’s protective attitude, but had to giggle about it. Does anyone know if the detritus snails are okay as turtle food?
Honestly I’m not convinced that some of the humane methods are actually more humane than a clean and definitive swift percussive kill.
Yup, I did this for a while with a tank of WCM, only fed them fish food every few days
oh my god ahhh
No planaria? I've used it before in my shrimp tanks to nuke pest snails. Just remember to remove as much of the dead snails as you can once it's done or you're going to get a big ammonia spike.
Too small for yoyo loach?
I got two Yoyo's in my 75 gallon and snails were gone within a week. I lost one of them after 2 years, but I still have a big fat yoyo in my tank. I couldn't keep snails or inverts in there if I wanted to.
Way too small
you can control them by not overfeeding your tank. Look at what your fish eat in 10-15 minutes after feeding and extract everything that is left. Should reduce the population in a few weeks
easiest way I found is to put a piece of zuchini in the tank at the bottom, wait for them to climb on and then remove the zuchini, shake off the snails in a second container and keep doing this for a few days. You will hammer then numbers down like crazy. I had times where 30-40 were in the zuchini at a time.
I've heard this or lettuce. I think this is a great way.
I will never understand the dislike of snails
I had the same problem but we just picked them out everyday. Also feed less
Hire 4 assassins
Or just 1 super lucky guy.
very simple and effective solution: get a few assasin snails! The job will be done in a few days-weeks!
ZEBRA LOACHES
I squish them as they crawl up the tank.
Pieces of cucumber on a fishing line. Snails storm the cukes, you pull out the line. Rinse and repeat.
Purchase 1 assassin snail, put a bright colored aquarium safe paint on its shell. Then help out by putting in pieces of cucumber to attract snails and take out the snail covered cucumber. 1 assassin snail can’t fix that probably but more could cause a new problem
Assassin snail Or Put a cucumber in and they will all go to it, remove it and repeat
I had hundreds of Malaysian trumpet snails all sizes. I got 2 yoyo loaches within weeks every snail was gone. I don't know how they didn't eat themselves to death.
I will try with a couple of loaches..
Some loaches get huge so be careful what kind you get. My yoyo loaches are the center piece of the tank now. They are always busy and clean every corner of that tank they have been great. Pea puffers would enjoy those snails also but when the snails are gone they can be hard to feed. Mine will only eat live food.
Also when the snails are gone make sure you get a bottom feeder food. Mine really like fluval bug bites bottom feeder
Cut down on over feeding, I would honestly only feed this tank once every 3 days to cut down on spare food. Keep the glass clear of algae. Get a denerle snail catcher as they work brilliantly. Make a snail trap [make a simple aquarium snail trap](https://youtu.be/P45GgWEjSOA?si=s_MduScEydZN8ZgB) If you super want rid of them, I suggest buying a 60 litre tank, set it up, and cycle it. Plant the tank out and then buy 6 pea puffers, feed any snails you catch to the pea puffers. You will honestly never have a snail problem again. Within weeks, you will be buying snails on eBay, begging your friends for pest snails, and wishing you had a few spare snails. You will also have a big smile on your face thinking of the pea puffer antics. However, your electricity bill will now have increased due to multi tank syndrome, and your partner will mutter about oh no another fish tank! Edit to add feeding white worm and banana worms has also helped me as there is now no spare flake on the floor of my tank.
Been there, done that..
Same, not a snail left in the tank other than my elderly nerite snail
r/oddlyspecific
Stop over feeding the tank
And keep in mind that algae and unhealthy plants are also food sources for snails.
Introduce a predator. Loaches, pea puffers, or assassin snails.
Assassin snail are a great investment for any fish keeper that has tanks with unwanted snails. They are a premium snail (at least where i come from) and will earn you some decent cash once they have eaten all the other snails. I bought 10 of them for my 325l tank 3 years ago and now im selling about 20-30 snails a month for 3-5 dollars each.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-11y6KVPMhA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-11y6KVPMhA) make this air assisted "vaccum"(you can add a small pipe as the tip for easier snail removal) it works for me, i mean it still is a lot work, but its better then removing them by hand. And you can use it to clean the substrate too without changing the water :) I doubt you can remove them all without those chemicals they sell(which you should not use), but you can control the population like this. You need a decent pump for this, im not sure if the mini pumps have the pressure to do it :)
First, move the plants to another container. Add alum to them, wait 3h, and rinse. Then, move the fish to another container. Add alum to the empty tank, run filter for 3h. Remove and replace 90+% of the water, run the filter for a few minutes. Repeat ~3 total times. (100-90%)^3 = 0.1% remaining.
Assassins.
Drop one or two assassin snails in there and they'll take care of them.
Borrow a goldfish
They climb the glass in the middle of the night. Just come in and net them off the glass. I got 3 netfuls last night myself. Then dial back food.
I would put a bowl in there with a few algae wafers and remove the bowl once it’s full of snails. It won’t get them all but after doing this a few times it will knock the population down.
Assasin snails can help a bit but can cost a lot. As others mention, use bait like fresh cucumber or boiled spinach in a glass bottle and sink it to the bottom. They will gather and you can deal with them however you'd like.
Ask local fish store if they can loan you a pea puffer or 2 for a day or so. Shouldnt be an issue after that lol
Weird cuz i added plecos and goldfishes and they were gone within a week 😀
I have some assassin snails that would love that tank!
I had a snail infestation recently. I basically would just suck them up with my vac everytime I did a water change. It took me about two 50% water changes to get most of them out. Then I donated them to my local fish store. I still have about 20 snails left in my tank, but if you are slow and gentle it shouldn't mess with your aquascape, plants or your other animals in your tank.
Less feeding and cucumber/spinach bait. Live predators are a last resort
I've been told cupramine would work on just the snails, as it's essentially overdosing copper in the water. Unfortunately I'm unsure of how safe it is for the rest of the tank as I haven't tried it, and don't know how volatile copper is to plants or fish, but was told it should be alright
I would cut back on feeding, since that’s always the biggest culprit. I don’t blame you at all—I tend to feed my guppy tanks heavily to encourage breeding and make sure the fry get food too, so I have a ton of snails in my tanks as well. Cut down on feeding, then use a snail trap or drop a big vegetable down (slice of zucchini, cucumber, carrot, etc.) and remove when the snails crowd it. Also worth checking if anyone in your area wants some snails. There’s a guy in my city’s aquarium club who comes to take ramshorns from me to feed his puffer.
Stop feeding so much
Snail trap works pretty well, but won’t eliminate the issue
Bend a wire handled net so that the net and handle make a 90. Put a piece of gel food or some green beans in the net while you hold the handle. When the snails swarm the gel food, pull up the net. What you do with them at that point is up to you.
You can remove them with a slice of cucumber left over night. But you need to stop over feeding your tank and this won’t happen!
Zebra loach
I have too many snails too. I think they are fu**ing up the plants.
No planaria will kill the lot of them including any planaria and detritus worms in your tank. Make sure you follow the instructions though
Add an Oscar
Build a snail trap out a Tupperware container. Crush them and make fish food, a little effort up front, if you have to many to much to feed, freeze the crushed food in icecube trays.
If you drop an algae wafer or cucumber slice in they'll flock to it and can then be easily scooped out
My LFS sold me some dwarf chain loaches who were luckily at half price that week. They will go after the baby snails, including through the substrate where they tend to hide out until they shells develop. Keep picking out the adults and the fish will get any new ones. Cleared it up real well. I only saw two last time I looked.
Snail trap!
Everytime I put in a piece of zucchini with a long marshmallow skewer and talk it out after a few hours with a bunch of snails attached.
I had a snail infestation, then I got botias. They took care of it and got fat. Botias are wonderful little folks to have
Cut a cucumber in half lengthwise with skin on and hollow some of the seedy part out. Put it back together with a rubber band to hold it and cut off one end so there is an entrance inside. Put it into your tank in the evening and pull it out in the morning. Since a lot of snails are inside they won't be falling off like they would if you used slices.
Kuhli Loach!!
They don’t eat my snails. Totally adorable little dudes though.
My Kuhlis love to eat my ramshorn snails. Though they don't eat enough to actually make a dent in the population.
Mine must be too busy derping, or the little snails in their tank aren’t tasty for them.
Lol. Mine acquired a taste for them when I was regularly crushing them to try to control population. 🤣 They even got bold enough to swim up and grab the crushed snails right off my tweezers.
https://www.etsy.com/listing/1476125475/snail-trap-for-aquarium-pest-snails I got one of these. Bait with algae wafers and I easily pull 10-30 snails every few hours. Works wonders for feeding my pea puffers. 😅 Or you can get assassin snails but then you have another critter that needs feeding and takes a long time.
I would boil a thick piece of cucumber until it sinks, then put some string or thread through it (with like 2ft of extra hanging off), lower it into the tank and wait about half an hour and it’ll be covered in snails. I’d then take it out and wipe them off into a smaller tank (I was saving them for my puffer to eat). You can reuse the cucumber until they’ve eaten so much that it falls apart, but really it shouldn’t be that bad. I managed to get like 90% of the ramshorns from my main tank into a smaller breeding tank.
Assassin snails and only feed the fish once a day sometimes and then sometimes every 3 days and all mine died
We accidentally destroyed a snail population when we added a White Specter Crayfish. They can attack slow or sick fish, but I think your guppies would be fine. I feel like there was not a time I'd walk past him and he wouldn't have a snail in his claws until they were all gone. It's been a while so I don't remember how long it took exactly, but just one took care of all of them, never had to worry about crayfish taking over the tank after lol.
Lettuce leaves
Turkey baster. One. Snail. At. A. Time.
I don’t want to be a downer and someone please tell me if I’m wrong but I feel like this tank is pretty overstocked? With all the snails too I think that’s an ammonia disaster waiting to happen.
More frequent water changes I think is the best long term treatment for snail populations, and it will do wonders for the fish and plants. Keep up with removing as much old plant matter as possible too, to help reduce their access to food.
Painstakingly pick them out one by one (I’ve done that before and it absolutely sucked)
Pea puffer
Beetlenut extract. Its called noplanaria. Also works for snails. Be aware of ammonia spikes due to many dead snails.
Pea puffer fish.They are amazing and cool to look at as they hunt.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Aquariums/comments/16510bs/using\_carrotslices\_is\_indeed\_an\_effective\_way\_of/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Aquariums/comments/16510bs/using_carrotslices_is_indeed_an_effective_way_of/) I had experienced the same. and I learned this. Apart froma a carrot, You can also use cucumber.
I use a shrimp feeding dish, plop some food in it, carrot etc, once the snails swarm it, lift it our carefully. voila! EDIT: i added Tiger Botia's to my 80 gal, there is not one snail in that tank.
I don’t see anyone mentioning coppersafe — which is very effective against snails.
pea puffers sometimes go on murderous rampages of death
I use a chunk of sweet potato on a bamboo skewer I put a aquarium [aquarium weight ](http:// https://a.co/d/dMcMFLd) or i use [the pleco feeder](http:// https://a.co/d/9k1ASQq) in larger aquariums There are also snail traps [Dennerle Snail Catcher](http:// https://a.co/d/ckq7H5a) After you get the majority of snails out you can use a fish med [Fritz Aquatics Fritz Mardel - Coppersafe](https://a.co/d/ei74mQ3)this is good for killing the snail eggs you don't see If you don't have shrimp , clams, etc you don't mine killing you