mopani wood

1317 Views 14 Replies 7 Participants Last post by jaidexl, Oct 15, 2007

DarrylR

Discussion Starter · Oct 14, 2007

4

I heard that Mopani Wood was one of the best Driftwood to buy and from Thailand or Malaysia. Today at Petco I happended to find a $30 one which was huge and I sooo wanted it. But the cost threw me off a bit :icon_eek:, so i turnt my head to the left and saw one on sale for $5.49! Was perfect sized for my 20 gallon. Also in some of the fish tanks I saw supposedly I thought MTS but the Petsmart people thought it was regular pond snails.

My question is, is Mopani Wood really one of the best driftwoods and won't rot or grow fungus. Also that the snails I found are MTS and not pond snails. The MTS snail pictures are bad but the look like: sprial shaped, black markings like half triangles on the shell.

The MTS markings do not look like this but the snail and the sprial snail is exactly the same, the markings are only different.

I equipped a MTS picture from another site but I guess it didn't stick, I was using it as a comparison.

See less See more

1 - 15 of 15 Posts

frozenbarb

· #2 · Oct 14, 2007

Yea that is A MTS. Mopaniu wood is good i have two of them in my tank.They are very hard wood, Dont fungus or anything Harder then malay DW

spypet

· #3 · Oct 14, 2007

I'd soak it a few hours, then take a toothbrush and gently rub off any loose wood parts especially in those blackened areas, then soak it a few more hours before sticking it in your tank. your piece has a lot of character. I got one (sight unseen) about the same size, but it's just a big oval knot, so I don't know how to use it. I guess eventually I'll just grow some Fissidens off it once I have a larger tank. I just hate putting driftwood in my 30gal tanks and steal valuable growing space from my plant collection.

See less See more

DarrylR

Discussion Starter · #4 · Oct 14, 2007

frozenbarb said:
Yea that is A MTS. Mopaniu wood is good i have two of them in my tank.They are very hard wood, Dont fungus or anything Harder then malay DW

So even with the blurry pic the description of the snail and spiral snail is enough to make it a MTS. If so, I am happy

. Didn't have to pay shipping and handling to buy a bunch of em.

spypet said:
I'd soak it a few hours, then take a toothbrush and gently rub off any loose wood parts especially in those blackened areas, then soak it a few more hours before sticking it in your tank. your piece has a lot of character. I got one about the same size, but it's just a big oval knot, so I don't know how to use it. I guess eventually I'll just grow some Fissidens off it once I have a larger tank. I just hate putting driftwood in my 30gal tanks and steal valuable growing space from my plant collection.

Ya the size was Small and that was 1 out of 5 pieces. Took me a while to decide which piece I wanted so I got this one. It looks big in the picture but it is a bit flat but does stick up due to a base part.

I was happy myself to find a smaller driftwood, the Petsmart I work at had Large for $30 and jumbo was $56, so this one was a major big find. Also is first driftwood.

DarrylR

Discussion Starter · #5 · Oct 14, 2007

The under side of the driftwood is pretty much all black, like a steak that was well done and burnt. I'm guessing to brush that side gently as well, is there a downfall if one side is all black mostly, or it is still okay to use?

spypet

· #6 · Oct 14, 2007

the black part is fine, and gives the wood more character.
you just want to get any dust and lose parts off before
putting it in your tank, that's all. you would do the same
with pretty much any driftwood, even from a LPS.

DarrylR

Discussion Starter · #7 · Oct 14, 2007

Yup in a 1 gallon I'm trying to breed the MTS, I always wanted from but didn't have a credit card to order them online

, it's awesome to find them in a Petsmart.

As for the wood, all I need is to attach the plants with string, right? I have java moss, anubis, and java fern.

jaidexl

· #8 · Oct 14, 2007

Trust me, you won't have any trouble breeding MTS, just add water.

BiscuitSlayer

· #9 · Oct 14, 2007

Did they charge you for the snails? I went into a petsmart one time, and they let me take about 100 off of their hands. They were actually moving some loaches from tank to tank to wipe them out.

JennysPlanties

· #10 · Oct 14, 2007

I got lots of free snails from Petsmart... they hijacked in on the plants I bought there.

I didn't mind them at all since they were the only animals in there and did a great job cleaning the enitire front of my tank.... it doesn't seem as if any survived the tear-down and re-scaping though. Poor little guys.

DarrylR

Discussion Starter · #11 · Oct 14, 2007

The snails were free and I bought a Peppered Corycat cause he was alone in the tank. That was when I saw the snails in his tank and noticed they weren't pond snails. So I asked the guy can I have that snail, he started walking away and I said AND," that one on the leaf" AND " that one on the rock". Than he started to walk faster away, I only got 3.

James From Cali

· #12 · Oct 14, 2007

DarrylR said:
The snails were free and I bought a Peppered Corycat cause he was alone in the tank. That was when I saw the snails in his tank and noticed they weren't pond snails. So I asked the guy can I have that snail, he started walking away and I said AND," that one on the leaf" AND " that one on the rock". Than he started to walk faster away, I only got 3.

lol. When I go into my local petsmart. They have Snails already bagged up xD. It is ridiculously funny. I had gotten a couple pure black ones in a batch and was so happy with them.

jaidexl

· #13 · Oct 14, 2007

JennysPlanties said:
it doesn't seem as if any survived the tear-down and re-scaping though. Poor little guys.

Don't underestimate them. I've had MTS and ramshorns come back from a long hiatus for seemingly no reason at all, some of those absences were from tear down/gravel switching, some were from medicating fish in the tank. In either case they seemed to come out of hibernation over time, some even seemed identifiable as older "grown up" snails that went MIA. It just happened with ramshorns in my 65gl, I experimented with low GH and saw a mass whitening a die off of all of my ramshorns. A few months later after getting it back up around 7dGH, two of the older big guys are back foraging around, only with white pitted shells.

DarrylR

Discussion Starter · #14 · Oct 15, 2007

I have another question, does it matter which side I attach the plants to the driftwood to? The side shown in the picture or the other side which is all black?

jaidexl

· #15 · Oct 15, 2007

Doesn't matter, just set the wood in he tank where it looks good, then tie or pin the plant wherever on the wood it looks best. You're dwelling on Spypet mentioning the black area, there's no difference, he just wanted to make sure you got it clean, there's no real difference in the black or brown parts.

1 - 15 of 15 Posts

This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.