Adding snails to breeding Shrimp Tank?

[Primetime Rob]

I have a breeding colony of about 15 yellow shrimp. I've only had them for a week or so and already several females are berried. I want to add a few snails to eat some algae, and because I like how they look.

Does anyone know if the snails are any danger to baby shrimp? It seems like it wouldn't be a problem but I wanted to hear some experienced opinions.

Also, anyone have a cool looking snail to recommend?

[itzjustjeff]

i've never seen a snail fast enough to catch a shrimp..but it'll be competing for food..which might adversely effect survival rate

[Primetime Rob]

Originally Posted by itzjustjeff

i've never seen a snail fast enough to catch a shrimp..but it'll be competing for food..which might adversely effect survival rate

Never thought of that. Has anyone every tried this?

[zzyzx85]

I've got a 10g of assassins and cherries (some wild-type). population of shrimp is still growing. Then again, I do overfeed a little.

[dj2005]

What snails do you plan to add? For algae I suggest Nerites.

It is highly unlikely the Nerites will eat anything besides algae and vegetables. MTS, brigs, and likely pond snails will compete for the shrimps' food.

As stated before, snails will likely be much too slow to attack baby shrimp, if they even have the desire to do so.

[invert1]

There was a great deal of discussion some months back about Assassin snails catching adult RCS so I would be wary of adding those to my shrimp tank but other than that I don't think you'll have a problem.

MTS would have the added benefit of tilling substrate but the negative being that you'd never see them (and they would also compete for food apparently). I'd also agree that nerites are your best bet (particularly since they're self-controlling population wise.

[bulrush]

In my shrimp tanks I have olive nerites and spixi snails. The nerites are kind of drab but do a good job of eating algae. They are the best invert algae eater I have tried yet. But I like the spixis also, and the spixis multiply, but slowly. The spixi shells don't seem to wear (get white spots) like the olive nerites also. (I have relatively soft water.)

[Ebichua]

I don't think I have EVER heard of shrimp dying due to starvation. Add the snails, they're the best tankmates for shrimp. Absolutely nothing to worry about. Even if the snails hog most of the algae wafers, the shrimp will still get food from it (a little), if not elsewhere.

Assuming that you have plants/moss in the tank, then you can probably just kick back and do nothing, even with snails in the tank.