Snails in my tank?!?!

Question

hello. i have a 75 gallon community tank which has about 3 or 4 differant verieties in the tank suck as gold fish, gouramiis and a adult silver dollers and some little fish. the tank is kept at about 28 degrees and all the fish are perfectly happy and healthy together. i just wanted to get some small water snails to help reduce alge on the rocks and plants. can u sugest what kind of snails to get and what to ask the fish shop assistant for when buying snails. never owned snails before so i am new to it. thanks

Answer 1

A few mystery snails are excellent little algea eaters.  I have four in my 20 gallon and they cleaned that thing right up.  In a 75 gallon you can also consider the larger apple snail.  They can get to about the size of a baseball and will eat algea.  The mystery snails don't get nearly as large, about silver dollar size max.

The tiny snails that come in on plants are a nussiance and will eat your vegatation but the larger varities like mystery and apple snails are quite beneficial.

Answer 2

Don't do it ! My daughter put some in my tank (on a plant) and now they are everywhere. They breed like crazy and I am fighting a loosing battle trying to get rid of the blasted things ( I really do not want to strip out the tank and boil the gravel but nothing else seems to be working.)

See about getting some fish that will eat the algae. Plecos do but they grow big, Siamese algae eaters are said to be aggressive ( although mine isn't) and I believe there are others that will do the job as well.

Answer 3

Make sure you get mystery snails or apple snails.  These types of snails are quite large and they are not asexual, which means it takes 2 of them to make babies.  If you ask for and can get Pomacea Bridgesii apple snails, those are the best.  They come in brown, golden, ivory, blue, red, red striped and purple striped.  They lay their eggs above the water line, so it's easy to see them and remove them if you don't want them to hatch.  Also, they will not eat your live plants.  They will only ever eat algae and dead or dying plant matter.  In fact, PB apple snails have even been known to starve to death in tanks with healthy plants rather than eat live plants!  The only kind of healthy plants I have ever known them to eat was duck weed.  They just love duck weed and can't resist it!  I think it must taste like chocolate to them!  LOL!  

For a treat, I feed mine pieces of zucchini and bits of fresh or frozen dill weed.  I love to feed them by hand.  If I put a tiny bit of dill on my finger and hold it very still next to one, it will l**k the bit of dill off of my finger tip.  I think it's so cool, because its raspy little tongue feels just like a teeny, tiny kitten tongue.  You have to be very careful, though, because if you move and bump the snail, it will go inside its shell and close the door.