Snail Waste Or Driftwood?

[Kiwifish]

Hey guys,

A couple of months ago I prepared some of my own driftwood I had collected from a beach. I boiled it for a few days and waterlogged it, so the tannins were a lot slower releasing.

For a while now I've also had an infestation of little snails...

It seems that as soon as I clean my tank, a build up of what looks like it could be snail waste (??) starts to collect right beside my driftwood. I'm not sure if this is just because snails congregate on the driftwood and all do their business from on there... Or whether this is the driftwood actually coming apart....

I've attached photos of my aquarium, the little snails, and the brown waste.

Is this normal and is there any solution for it / or any recommendations on helping keep the snail numbers down!?

Any help would be appreciated thanks!

 

[JoeCamaro]

Beautiful tank!

I can't tell if it is snail waste or not as I do not have snails, but I do have a piece of cholla wood and little pieces of it accumulate next to it. All the time. Similar to your photo.

Could be pieces of driftwood, but I can;t tell for sure.

 

[mickmanin]

That actually looks very similar to the substrate around my little piece of driftwood in my tank with Nerite snails. I believe it's the shavings of the wood by the snails teeth scraping it.

 

[Kiwifish]

Thanks Joe & Mickmanin!

This definitely makes sense, due to the amount of little snails in my tank and the speed at which these scrapings build up - otherwise I'd be pretty worried for the snails!

Do you folks have any good strategies for cleaning up the infestation..? I've tried hand picking them out regularly, and also dropping in blanched vegetables hoping they'll gather on it. Not so much luck so far though!

 

[mickmanin]

That's the tough part, there's no real good answer to this. Maybe try putting a vegetable in there overnight when the tank's light's off if you haven't tried that yet. If it was me; I'd welcome them. Snails are great for the ecosystem of an aquarium.