Malaysian Trumpet snail questions

[secuono]

I love MTS, easy to catch bunches with an algae wafer or cucumber slice. They move very slowly, so i don't think they would really mess up your substrate much at all. And with that pretty rock 1 inch thick, the dirt they do displace will just gather between the rocks, shouldn't make it all the way up top.

[angelsword]

Mine goes in a scrunchi (sp?) But not pulled all the way through on the last twist. Girls with long hair know what I mean. It just falls and needs redone. Ok, I'm going to quit talking about snails in my hair now lol

On the subject of horrible evil immortal MTS, they DO NOT eat plants.

Now on the subject of Latvian hair tips, well, I don't know anything about Latvian hair care or capped substrates for that matter.

[Amandas tank]

Hello... I have a ton. How soon do you want them? If you can wait until the mad rush of Christmas passes, I will happily send you some. I have so many they are out an any hour of the day. They breed like wild fire I will warn you. But, like others have said, it's easy enough to bait them. They especially love cucumber.

[DogFish]

Originally Posted by driftwoodhunter

.....Speaking of which, one of the vids said they add a tremendous amount to the tank's existing bioload - so don't add them to tanks if you are concerned about the ammonia that the snails make...

Right, snail poop is going to create an Ammonia spike.


Send that person a link to my Tonic Ten Tank and their head will explode.

[driftwoodhunter]

Originally Posted by DogFish

Right, snail poop is going to create an Ammonia spike.


Send that person a link to my Tonic Ten Tank and their head will explode.

haha! I never thought of your Toxic Ten - that would make their head explode!

[driftwoodhunter]

Originally Posted by angelsword

Mine goes in a scrunchi (sp?) But not pulled all the way through on the last twist. Girls with long hair know what I mean. It just falls and needs redone. Ok, I'm going to quit talking about snails in my hair now lol

Well, my hair falls to the middle of my back. I'm so forgetful that if I leave it in a regular ponytail and it brushes the back of my neck I scare myself - lol! Guess I love the horror movies too much

[driftwoodhunter]

Originally Posted by Amandas tank

Hello... I have a ton. How soon do you want them? If you can wait until the mad rush of Christmas passes, I will happily send you some. I have so many they are out an any hour of the day. They breed like wild fire I will warn you. But, like others have said, it's easy enough to bait them. They especially love cucumber.

I dunno, I've been reading about your postal horror stories! Do you think they would live long enough to get to me? I'm not in any hurry at all, this is just a thought I've been tossing around for some time. The latest MTS thread got me thinking again...if you think they would survive the cold, we can do a paypal thing after the holidays.

btw, how are you feeling?

[Amandas tank]

Still sicker than a dog...blah but I have been on here today trying to figure out something about lighting my tank. Anyway...they don't carry MTS here so I had some shipped to me last winter from a hobbyist. They seemed dead honestly but didn't smell foul so I put them in the tank and sure enough a few weeks went by and BAM! I got snails! More than I'd like to have. Some days I wish I hadn't ever got them, but they aren't that bad. I just need to keep up with them. I have given some to my LFS so they will start to sell them around here next summer I bet They will have so many they may just give them away!

So...if you decide to get them...you have been warned. They will suprise you one day. You look in the tank and see a couple here and there, then another day you take a look and you see hundreds! Just imagine how many more ya don't see

[hobos]

They will get into your filter and are big breeders its hard to get rid of them, if you live in a cold climate you could do it by removing the substrate into buckets along with any sponges (the young love hiding out in sponges) and placing everything outside during winter and let it freeze for a few days that should do it or boil everything. Do allot of reading before adding them once there in there in. some people don’t like them they only eat decaying plant matter and love algae. The smaller once will remove allot of algae from leaves there so tiny they can climb on the smallest leaves and get into every spot. You can also remove some manually at night after the lights go out just pick them off the glass.

By the way no worries my thread is your thread

[driftwoodhunter]

argh! I am so wishy-washy! I still need to think on this. I like snails, but I don't want ten thousand. I just had a vision of finding ten thousand behind my Hamburg Mattenfilter, lol. Although that would make baiting them easy

Even so, I like snails...I don't know. I trust Frank, and if they work for him...

[Amandas tank]

oh...one thing I should mention...they actually compete with my kuhli loaches. If the kuhlis don't eat fast, the MTS will smother the loaches food. I do hate that. I know many experienced aquarist say they only breed according to the amount of food fed to the fish. Not true in my experience. These things continue to breed and it is my opinion that I see them at all hours because there isn't enough food for them so they are constantly searching, stealing food from my fish.

[Amandas tank]

Originally Posted by driftwoodhunter

argh! I am so wishy-washy! I still need to think on this. I like snails, but I don't want ten thousand. I just had a vision of finding ten thousand behind my Hamburg Mattenfilter, lol. Although that would make baiting them easy

Even so, I like snails...I don't know. I trust Frank, and if they work for him...

Yeah...definetely take your time and think about it. Mine don't get into my filters or even climb the glass, but they are everywhere else...in the plants, on the dw and rocks and burrowing along the top layer of substrate.

Okay...I feel like crud. I'm logging loff. Talk to you later.

[angelsword]

Originally Posted by Amandas tank

oh...one thing I should mention...they actually compete with my kuhli loaches. If the kuhlis don't eat fast, the MTS will smother the loaches food. I do hate that. I know many experienced aquarist say they only breed according to the amount of food fed to the fish. Not true in my experience. These things continue to breed and it is my opinion that I see them at all hours because there isn't enough food for them so they are constantly searching, stealing food from my fish.

I agree with your points here, feeding algae wafers or shrimp pellets to bottom dwellers becomes very difficult because the snails cover the food. And they don't breed according to the amount of food added because in the tank I wasn't adding any food to there were still hundreds of teeny babies floating on the surface every day.

[DogFish]

Originally Posted by Amandas tank

oh.... I know many experienced aquarist say they only breed according to the amount of food fed to the fish. Not true in my experience. These things continue to breed and it is my opinion that I see them at all hours because there isn't enough food for them so they are constantly searching, stealing food from my fish.....

Two good points on the topic.

1st - Food source.

This is often misquoted/misunderstood. It's not about really about adding flake food, it's about TOTAL FOOD SOURCE. Food is a limiting factor in reproduction for all living things. So it's not just left over flakes, it's algae, dead plant material, detritus, etc.

2nd - Population control.

I think a indicator of when to cull is when they start breaking their natural cycle of being buried during the day, out in the open at night.

I look at my Ramshorns and MTS as algae management tools. Just as water changes and pruning are a regular part of maintenance so is culling snails.

[somewhatshocked]

The issue isn't that you're not providing food. In a 55 gallon tank, there's a ton of surface area for biofilm to grow. Tons of room for bacteria to develop in the substrate. That's an endless food supply.

Originally Posted by angelsword

Once you have them they're hard to get rid of. People say oh you're just feeding too much. Even in a a heavily planted 55 gallon that had no fish and therefore no food added they maintained a population of about 17 billion.