Control of Snails

[nostalgia]

Hello all planted tank friends~
how do u guys control snails in your tank?

1)prevent them from entering tank in the very first place
2)manually taking them out
3)using something to suck them out
4)using puffer fish
5)using clown loaches
6)others (pls explain further eg. method or other type of fishes)

[sepat]

use puffer fish

[bingyan]

Does Pufferfish only eat snails?

I got a whole tankful of snails at one time so I put two puffer fish in.

within a day, all the snails disappeared.

the week following that, my pufferfish seems to get thinner and thinner. Is it because it only eat snails and nothing else?

The two fellow has since died maybe because of starvation.

any comments?

[Weirong]

Puffer eats lots of other stuff, including flakes and worms. Actually any other stuff you use to feed your other fish.
And they can really terrorize your other fish in the tank when they are hungry...

[Simon]

i prefer using apistogramma and manually removing those visible.. puffer are too aggressive and known to be tail-nipper

[David]

yup...pretty true.....puffers are too agressive and will make short work of the fins of your other prized fishes. Use Aspitos or Rams...very effective snail hunters.....that is provided if you dont feed them too much goodies.

[bclee]

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On 6/15/2003 11:19:19 PM

Puffer eats lots of other stuff, including flakes and worms. Actually any other stuff you use to feed your other fish.
And they can really terrorize your other fish in the tank when they are hungry...
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Trust me... 99.99% of the puffers DO NOT eat flakes. They only eat live food and ocassionally frozen worms... nothing else. So those of you who wants to keep puffers... BEWARE! You do not want those fellas to starve to death if you do not intend to feed live food.

They are fin nippers too. So be prepared that once in a while the fins of your other fishes get nipped by them.

Check this site on puffers.

BC

[Weirong]

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[/quote]
Trust me... 99.99% of the puffers DO NOT eat flakes. They only eat live food and ocassionally frozen worms... nothing else. So those of you who wants to keep puffers... BEWARE! You do not want those fellas to starve to death if you do not intend to feed live food.

They are fin nippers too. So be prepared that once in a while the fins of your other fishes get nipped by them.

Check this site on puffers.

BC
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[/quote]

You could get the mini puffers. They remain small and never grow big in size.
So far, I have been having good luck with them (almost 4 months). But they still terrorize yr other fish ocassionally...
But nothing will happen as long as you keep them well-fed.

[joe]

i agree with bclee on this ... they only like live food ... even frozen bloodworms they might not like it ... i had to wriggle the bw before they would take it ... ended up sending the puffers away

[hwchoy]

Since I added a pair of Parosphromenus sp. (licorice gourami) my snails had completely disappeared, except those still crawling around on the substrate under the hairgrass. They don't climb up the glass sides in the night either. The rest of the population are all barbs and rasboras, so that left the gourami as the killer.

[FND]

Hi hwchoy,

that's news to me, bro! Didn't know that Parosphromenus sp. (licorice gourami) can control snails. My tank is has alot of snails too. Daily I've been pulling the out from my tank manually. It's a tedious effort. Keep on seeing that the population multiply even more than what I pulled out![]

May I know where did you get yours and how much does it cost? Will one Parosphromenus sp. (licorice gourami) enough for a 4ft tank?

I already have the followings in my tank,

Harlequins x 10
Neon Tetra x 16
Rummy Nose x 13
Black Widow Tetra x 3
Cherry Barb x 4
Romboocelatus (spelling??) x 3
Angel fish x 2
Snakeskin Discus x 2

Thanks.

[hwchoy]

well it was surprising to me too as the licorice gourami has very small mouth and I was worried they're not going to be properly fed, however I have seen them hovering around and inside my hairgrass, picking at stuff. I have them for months now and they look nice and healthy. Quite possibly they are picking out the young snail (does juvenile snails exist in larvae form?) and other microorganisms. Others have said their gourami doesn't seem to eat snails so your mileage may vary, I believe it is the gouramies because there aren't any other predators in the tank.

Got mine from Biotope (see LFS list), most of them from Kalimantan but mine are from Jambi, Sumatra. Depending on the species, at Biotope they're going for around $3-$6 each, but you usually buy a pair. Nice and quiet fish that roams the bottom, only about 3-4cm.

Here's a pic of my Parosphromenus sp. 'Jambi' looking for food in the hairgrass

[juggler]

I swear by my section of ghost shrimps (feeder shrimps). They eat Ramshorn Snails but not the tunelling Malayan Trumpet Snails.

[David]

Juggler....you train your Ghost Shrimps to be snail hunters is it?...whahahhaa...how many months conversion course does your shrimps got to go through......whahahhahaa

Seriously are you sure about ghost shrimps?

[nostalgia]

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On 6/16/2003 5:51:17 PM

I swear by my section of ghost shrimps (feeder shrimps). They eat Ramshorn Snails but not the tunelling Malayan Trumpet Snails.
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this is amazing...... how did u do it?

[juggler]

It's not amazing. Try it and see the difference. Cheap and good snail controllers.

But beware not to put those that are too big with pincers. They can catch your tetras for dinner.

I have some pictorial evidence in this thread.

[TBI]

base on all info given.....my conclusion for the best snails cleaners is 1st RAM!!
puffer nib at fins once in awhile.....(personal encounter also)

ghost shrimps are like ghost that makes your fish disappear if u put too much of those inside. so how much should u put?? especially hungry ghost festival is coming....heehee

snails chemical kill all snails and everything inside e tank too!

rams are e best!! but not ramstorm. heehee. any objection????

[Allen_1971]

did anyone mention loaches? they are pretty good at it too. Try a botia sidthimunki or yo-yo loach... both stay pretty small and are good community fish... you just need to bear with the occasional U shape bite mark on your leaves.

[TBI]

the botia sidthi...(dwarf loach) hardly can be seen nowadays.. anybody know where can get some of those and about how much???
it is the BEST schooling loach in e aquarium.
[:0]

[theodore]

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On 6/15/2003 10:24:45 PM

Hello all planted tank friends~
how do u guys control snails in your tank?

1)prevent them from entering tank in the very first place
2)manually taking them out
3)using something to suck them out
4)using puffer fish
5)using clown loaches
6)others (pls explain further eg. method or other type of fishes)
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1) If only I knew abt snail prevention when I first started my tank (
2) Gave up after 1 day.
3) Used a DIY device (hard plastic tubing + airline tubing + syringe) to suck them out every night. Gave up after 2 weeks.
4) Got a puffer and the snails cleared within 2 days! Took it out when 1/2 my fishes displayed nipped fins and I cant find any Malayan shrimps after lights off. Snail population rebounded after 1 week.
5) Havent tried that 1 before (2ft tank is a bit small for clown loaches)

6) Well, I've accepted them as part of my tank. Besides, I think they are doing a good job on my xmas moss so far.