[mle]

Hello all!

I was researching some things i'm not liking about my fish tank and stumbled onto this place. I've always had fish tanks and not so long ago switched onto planted freshwater. (yay!)
I have a 55gal that i've put different plants I thought were pretty and weren't completely high maintenance. I have black long fined tetras, lemon tetras, embers, oto's, some punk colored zebra fish that were insisted upon :icon_roll, black stripped tetras, armano shrimp, and cherry shrimp...


But my issue is, snails... I have a HUGE Olive snail.. (it's okay, it doesn't like the taste of my plants so far..) but these other ones (no idea what they are), they are just a PAIN! and they wont go away.. everytime i turn around there's an egg sack hiding or babies nomming on my plant.. They've successfully eaten my entire gorgeous dwarf red lily and working on the next batch from the bulb...


Is there any suggestions you might have to getting rid of these little buggers besides just picking them out one by one?

 

[artemis]

Two suggestions:

1. Put a piece of cucumber or zucchini on your tank bottom. Snails love this stuff. Pluck the piece up (along with all the snails clinging to it) in the morning before your tank's lights go on and the snails go back into hiding.

2. Add some snail-eating fish to your tank. Most people recommend various loaches. Unfortunately, there's an excellent chance that any snail-eating fish will decide to snack on your shrimps and your non-problematic olive snail as well. Of course, if you're willing to set up a small invert-only tank, you could move the olive snail and the shrimps to safer lodgings before turning the loaches loose on snail-assassination duty.

 

[mle]

I like that cucumber idea! thank you!



The armano shrimp I have might put up a decent fight if the fish is smaller than them.. they are rather large and ornery! They chase off the current fish and i've caught one feasting on a snail.. :hihi:
But, better safe than sorry!


Thank you, i appreciate the advise!

 

[artemis]

You're welcome! I hope you soon have the snail plague well under control.

 

[mle]

The snail infestation demise is under way!


The cucumbers worked great! I got up this morning and the snails had eaten almost a whole piece (I put 4 in there). So i picked up the pieces and just kinda tossed them outside.

I also went to the store and the guy talked me into a clown loach.. =/ I moved my cherry shrimp, olive snail, and my lily bulb out of the tank. I left the armano shrimp because they are bigger than the loach. I am a little nervous about my two african diving frogs (which i forgot to mention above). I'm kind of starting to think this impulse purchase was not as bright of an idea as i might have thought at the time... oh well! If it doesn't work out, i'll build a nano tank or something for this lil guy.

 

[lauraleellbp]

If you were referring to the clown loach as "little guy" he won't stay that way long... they can grow well over 12"

 

[mle]

If you were referring to the clown loach as "little guy" he won't stay that way long... they can grow well over 12"

eek! :eek5:

Time to go tank shopping! :hihi:

 

[PROLINKer]

I love that cucumber idea too, gotta try that on my planted tank as well.

 

[artemis]

The cucumber idea is an aquatic variation of the old gardener's trick of setting a plate of beer out in the garden to lure slugs to their doom. Give the little nasties something they enjoy, and trick them into a trap! It's a lot easier to pluck the snails out when they're all fastened onto a single piece of food rather than scattered randomly all over the tank.