[bigbites]

Im sure this is a total noob question.. but here goes..
Got a few snails with some plants I ordered recently.. they are very tiny.. brown guys..

Can I assume they are harmless or should I remove them as I find them?

No fish yet.. still very early in tank life..

 

[pantherspawn]

Generally you get pond snails with plants.. Sometimes ramshorns. Neither will injure your plants or anything else, they live off of algae and can help a new tank setup, or even an established one. Most people just don't like the look of them. I didn't at first, so got assassin snails to remove them.. Since then, I've grown to like them and appreciate them and have them in pretty much all of my tanks. And even breed them to feed my puffer.

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[AquaAurora]

I have pond snails in my tanks and they are not harmful. They do not eat healthy plants but will eat dieing plant matter and algae, along with uneaten fish/shrimp food. People assume because they see snails on dead/damaged plants that the snails did it, not that they're just cleaning up what already happened. They cleaned up a no-tech dirted vase I'm trying to rejuvenate some small Argentinian swords in. Thought the leaves were nearly dead.. nope, algae.. snails made them clean and green again, they also work on the diatoms that bid up on the glass (though not as well as otos)^^
I actually have a wood soaking bin with a ton of pond snails in there, I throw in leftover zucchini from pleco feeding and let their # shore up. Going to be getting dwarf puffers soon and they love to eat snails so free food source.
I also have a few micro ramshorns but they don't breed as fast as the pond snails.
Anyways if you don't like them they are easily squished under your finger (or any object). Buggers seem indestructible for water parms though, can have lethal ammonia/nitrite/nitrate levels for anything else (off the charts for api test kit) and they still do fine.

 

[Agent69]

Yes they actually do an awesome job on cleaning algae and taking care of leftovers but sometimes they get out of hand that's why you got to keep them at bay.

 

[lochaber]

Another pro-snail vote here.

I generally find them beneficial - they rarely eat plants (I don't want to say never, just because my experience is limited), and generally seem to prefer detritus, old food, biofilms, and algae. If I set up a new tank, I'll generally add snails.

I generally think that diversity is a good thing, so as long as a given organism isn't actually harming another desired organism in my tank, I'll probably welcome it's presence.

Plus, I think snails make great emergency clean-up crews. Accidently get too much food in the tank, or have a fish die while you are unaware? Snails will take care of that problem for you

 

[Shremph]

Just don't overfeed your tank and pond snails are a pretty nice addition to any tank. Overfeeding can lead to a population explosion. When I started my first tank i was a chronic over feeder and I eventually had snails that nearly outnumbered my gravel. I learned (slowly over time) how to better feed and everything in my tanks got better. Over feeding is the devil :x

 

[Lab_Man]

Generally you get pond snails with plants.. Sometimes ramshorns. Neither will injure your plants or anything else, they live off of algae and can help a new tank setup, or even an established one. Most people just don't like the look of them. I didn't at first, so got assassin snails to remove them.. Since then, I've grown to like them and appreciate them and have them in pretty much all of my tanks.

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I just started a planted tank in December. Like you, I wanted a snail free tank and was unhappy when they started appearing a couple weeks after my first plants.

To echo pantherspawn, they don't harm your plants and will help you in eating some of your dead plant material and some algae.

The population seems to be somewhat self regulating. I seem to have less than 50 in my 50 gallon. The population yo-yos but the people on the forum say that if you overfeed the fish the population of snails skyrockets in accordance with your overabundance of food for them to eat. limit their available food and the snail population will decline.

I actually do not notice them much now.

 

[bigbites]

Thanks guys...I have no fish yet...gonna start the cycle soon..today possibly.
Today I found what I think are snail eggs on a leaf...lol

 

[Mirkinator]

I also breed them to feed my puffers and skunks loaches. Infact I have to use a seperate tank as my Skunks will obliterate a bag of 30 pond snails in a night, but they dont seem to do much to my MT snails. Personally i like the MTS snails better as they help till my substrate