SNAILS?

[wyatt]

I had just made a new aquarium and added snails for filters. as soon as they got in there, my nvv attacked the snails tryin to get them. they were too big, but it was weird. if i smashed these(sorry for the grossness) would they eat them?

 

[jesper]

Sals eat snails happily, snails often have parasites though so I try to avoid it. Also their shell can probably cause intestinal blockage - if the snail is small and the newt is big enough that is. Big snails are drawn out of their shells - I have seen my paramesotritons do this many times.

 

[jeff]

I would recomend going to like a petstore and looking for "mystry snails" get a big one and the newts won't bother it, yop need one that is the size of a golf ball, well not that round but at least that diameter. Belive me, newts wil not be able to screw with somthing that big as long as you feed them good. But accidents do happen when food is present,

and one is more then enough to keep a 10-20 gallon tank clean.

plus they are so cool to watch, they are so fast

(Message edited by newtsrfun on January 31, 2005)

 

[jesper]

Jeff isn't those kind of snails a bit dangerous to the newts? People have written about newts attacking big snails, the snails have responded by shutting their "door"(dont remember the correct term here) on a newt trying to get its mouths into the shell of the snails thus slitting the throat of the newt.

 

[hope]

I need info about black mystry snails. Do they lay eggs,is the male bigger????ect.

 

[wyatt]

Hope, a snail is not female nor male. as long as you have 2 snails they will breed. snails have both male and female organs, so they have no difference. they lay eggs.

 

[k]

Wyatt, this is only true of some snails. Apple snails, including mystery snails, are not hermaphrodites but have differentiated genders.

Hope, take a look at the FAQ for this site: http://www.applesnail.net/ . There's info on sexing them there.

 

[jeff]

Well it is true that a newt may attempt to eat a snail, however the black "mystery" snail I bought is way to bug for a newt to consider prey. This snail is almost the size of a golf ball.
However, I would not recomend mixing them unless you were sure. Newts won't attmmpt to eat anything larger then their head is what I believe, but I do breed a smaller species that they can eat that will also breed and clean.

I suppose that there is no way to be sure of what the newts will try to eat. Who else has has experiance with this?

 

[russ]

I placed a WC Pseudotriton r. ruber larvae in an aquarium a while back that already had a few small snails in it. The snails apparently rode in on some plants I bought at a pet store. After about a month I noticed that algae had started to grow on the glass, which had never done before. Upon closer inspection I realized all the snails were gone. They had been there for severals months, and the ruber larvae was the only occupant, so my assumption is that it ate them. I keep meaning to go out and catch a few local native snails and see if they disappear too.

 

[sharon]

I hit up my local petshop with dedicated plant tanks and have them scoop up all the snails in the tanks for my Tiger Sal. 25 or 30 snails rarely live long enough to reproduce.

I figure if they ever do get out of control, my goldfish and baby guppies will do a bang up clean up job.