Accidental Snail Addition

HI guys,

I recently bought some Java Moss from my LFS and ended up with a random snail. It's ironic that I ended up with a snail because in that same trip, the LFS guy vehemently tried convincing me to get a snail as an addition to my tank (as I was looking for a critter addition), but I was being stubborn and thinking taking care of a snail would be gross. Anyways, I've named this snail George and I guess he's staying as long as he's not a problem.

I'm curious to know more about George, but he is ridiculously small. He is likely less than half an inch in length, his shell appears to be more cone shaped, and I know little to nothing about aquatic freshwater snails. Would I be able to ID him now or should I wait until he gets larger? My tank is currently uninhabited (its under construction for a betta) so George is the only animal in the tank. Will he have enough to eat to survive? I do have small amounts of algae growing on some anubias, but I'm not sure if he'll find it. My tank is ginormous compared to this little guy.

Thanks!

 

Well if it's tiny and came with plants, more than likely it is a pest snail and may begin to reproduce with itself like no tomorrow. You could post a pic and we should be able to tell you exactly what type he is.

 

Well if it's tiny and came with plants, more than likely it is a pest snail and may begin to reproduce with itself like no tomorrow. You could post a pic and we should be able to tell you exactly what type he is.

Should I remove him then? When you say pest, I'm not sure if that means he will become a problem. I don't have a camera good enough to get a picture of him. Do you happen to know of a guide or dichotomous key that'll help me narrow it down? I'm fairly comfortable with snail anatomy to piece it together, I just don't really know where to begin.

 

George will find food. George is probably a pond or bladder snail and George may multiply. I have one that came same way and over 3 weeks its size has tripled. It's still now just 1/4 " long. It was miniscule so I couldn't see it for days. They are great cleaners of algae and stuff. Just so you are aware the snail is most likely the kind that could multiply. I got four zebra Nerite snails that are also very good cleaners. They don't multiply like the hitchhikers usually do. I am letting my hitcher be for now. She's working nonstop on my small leave plants with algae that are too miniscule for larger snails to grip.

 

Well some different types you can google are bladder snails, pond snails, and ramshorn snails. Those are the most common. Some other could be malaysian trumpet snails or assassin snails but I think those are harder to find in plants. You can remove him if you want but snails make excellent clean up crews

 

Do a Google search, "what snail is this," and you will probably find it.

 

Well, I'm not terribly bothered by him. If he ever touches me, we'll have a huge problem, but him being there isn't the end of the world. If George is a self-fertilizer, at what point should I be concerned about the population? Since I plan on getting a betta, I think it could be fun to watch it go Godzilla on a bunch of snails, but my priority is the betta. So is there a point where too many snails would be bad for a betta's survival?

 

I think the Betta might just take care of baby snails, and they will be good live food for him. If he doesn't eat them and you end up with bunches you can put lettuce leaf in tank overnight and catch bunches at a time to get them out.

 

Update: I think George brought parasites. I just came back from hanging out with friends and found George on the tank glass whipping his shell back and forth. When I looked closer, I saw a small stringy thing wriggling out of his side. I looked over my tank glass and found about 10 worms. Are these, in fact, parasites? If so, how do I get rid of them? I planned on buying another tank soon and have a bag of bio-media sitting in this George tank and I'm afraid I can't use it in my new tank now to get it instantly cycled. Will I have to bleach this George tank?

 

Lol that’s poop. Snails eat constantly, and they gotta poop it all out somewhere.

 

No, it can't be poop. There were about 10 on the tank glass wriggling far away from George. I've been Googling "snail brought worms in aquarium" and am wondering if they could be detritus worms?

 

Oh they were actually moving? Weird

Could totally have been poop otherwise. I added a single pond snail to a fresh jar I set up and when I came back like 4 hours later, the bottom was littered with little poops. He went nuts on the algae lol

 

Oh they were actually moving? Weird

Could totally have been poop otherwise. I added a single pond snail to a fresh jar I set up and when I came back like 4 hours later, the bottom was littered with little poops. He went nuts on the algae lol

Lol, yeah, after reading your post, I went back to take a second look at my tank just to be sure. He was on an anubias earlier and I found plenty of little poops on there.

 

So fun fact, there are not one, but two Georges!

George has grown quite a bit in the past week (probably half an inch now) and I just spotted two snails at the same time! OG George now has a distinct brown shell with white stripes (?) or white protrusions on the back third of his shell. I'm looking up pictures of aquarium snails now, but can anyone help me ID him?

Ah, jk, I finally found some pictures of snails that look like him. He's a pond snail! Are these good for bettas? Will the population suddenly bloom? Do they reproduce often? I have only seen one George baby, but am unsure if there could be more.

 

I reckon you'll have about 20 in a month, depending on how much food is available to them.

 

I reckon you'll have about 20 in a month, depending on how much food is available to them.

I've been having a lot of problems with dying plants lately so my guess is a lot? I don't think I'm too worried about it now if there's a population bloom. This tank will still be a betta tank, but when I finally get a betta in there, I'll also purchase a small tank to farm snails for the betta on a regular basis (and transfer any existing snails to this new snail tank). If I farm snails to feed to a betta, are they still susceptible to giving my betta parasites?