iguanagrrl13
New member
Anyone else have issues with fine sand sticking to snail slime trails on glass?
I am cycling a new tank (have several others for frogs, fish, turtles, axolotls, etc., and have plenty of aquarium experience) to move some of my axolotls. It has fine sand for substrate. I have been cycling the tank for almost 3 months with plants, snails, and a few rosy red minnows (parasite free from my own breeding stock for use as occasional turtle food). The new tank is 75 gallons with low light plants and low-level LED lighting on a timer (with plenty of hides for the lotls to stay out of the light).
I am using Malaysian trumpet snails because they help to move the sand around and release gases. However, the glass gets unsightly between cleaning/water changes. The snails chug around on the glass at night, then somehow very find sand particles get stuck to the slime trails. The filter is an external canister filter with a spray bar to reduce flow once the axies move in to the tank. I also have sponges/filter floss in place to further reduce output force. So it's not like the filter is too strong and blowing the sand all around within the tank. Not sure how the sand/slime trails happen.
Just weird and makes the tank less attractive. I don't have the slime/sand trails with any of my other tanks regardless of substrate, filter, or type of snail (have 5 different types of snails).
(Side note: Before moving the axies, I will be removing any of the snails large enough to cause issues for the axolotls, so no worries there. I grow the snails in my other aquariums, then use the larger ones as snacks for turtles and pufferfish.)
I am cycling a new tank (have several others for frogs, fish, turtles, axolotls, etc., and have plenty of aquarium experience) to move some of my axolotls. It has fine sand for substrate. I have been cycling the tank for almost 3 months with plants, snails, and a few rosy red minnows (parasite free from my own breeding stock for use as occasional turtle food). The new tank is 75 gallons with low light plants and low-level LED lighting on a timer (with plenty of hides for the lotls to stay out of the light).
I am using Malaysian trumpet snails because they help to move the sand around and release gases. However, the glass gets unsightly between cleaning/water changes. The snails chug around on the glass at night, then somehow very find sand particles get stuck to the slime trails. The filter is an external canister filter with a spray bar to reduce flow once the axies move in to the tank. I also have sponges/filter floss in place to further reduce output force. So it's not like the filter is too strong and blowing the sand all around within the tank. Not sure how the sand/slime trails happen.
Just weird and makes the tank less attractive. I don't have the slime/sand trails with any of my other tanks regardless of substrate, filter, or type of snail (have 5 different types of snails).
(Side note: Before moving the axies, I will be removing any of the snails large enough to cause issues for the axolotls, so no worries there. I grow the snails in my other aquariums, then use the larger ones as snacks for turtles and pufferfish.)