Breeding Pest Snails for food

Sounguru

Sounguru

Guru at being an expert
Jul 18, 2008
1,104
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Across the great pond from the Commie state of Sea
I have had quite a few questions on how I breed my pest snails to keep my assassins and other snail eating species fed. As some of you may not know I seem to be king of the pest snail since I have crossed the 2500 point on pest snails last time I tried to count and that was just 3 of 10 tanks.:evil_lol:

So here is how I do it. Well on one of my tanks that provides the highest output anyway.:)

So here is what you need:

10 Gallon tank or larger
Sponge filter or small power filter (I prefer the power filter myself)
sponge or fine filter bag
coral sand
Any Decor you want
Light
food
Heater (not needed but can make a difference)

Setup the tank and decorate any way you see fit with around .5 to 2 inches of sand on the bottom. Deeper sand if you want plants shallow sand if you don't. Now if you opt to use a heater set that at 76 degrees. I have found that this temp gives you the fastest production rate and keeps the shells from growing to fast where they become paper thin or have errosion issues.

Now add the filter if you are using a power filter cover the intake with sponge or a fine mesh filter bag to keep it from sucking the snails in. If you opt for the sponge filter route put an elbow at the top to get the water flowing thru the tank. I have found this improves the sponge filters ability to keep the tank in better shape. I also have found that without the elbow you actually can develop a dead layer of water at the bottom of the tank that the snails will move up and out of which is away from the food source, it also helps in keeping all levels of the tank at the same temp.

Now go get your starting colony of snails. I have found that mixing MTS and Rams is not a real good idea because as one or the other population gets bigger they will out compete the other for food. Plus I like to breed for color so I'm even more of a nut on my pest snails than some need to be.

Now add a calcium puck once a week and feed green beans or similar food everyday, but I have found green beans work the best. Make sure that the old food is gone before you add new food don't want the tank to go bad. An indication of this is when all the snails are holding at the top of the tank. This is also an indication of that dead water space I was talking about.

Do regular water changes as you would on any tank but go about 50% and you should have a good feeder colony in under 2 months.

Snail Jello or Plaster puck how-tos are located here
 
In fact, it is so easy to breed pest snails that you can do it without even trying :D

Kristina
 
2 weeks after adding plants to my cycling aquarium I already have a small army of pest snails... and I'm not even feeding the aquarium! (well besides a small tab of snello once every 4 or 5 days).

Snails just seem to spontaneously generate out of thin air... or thin water rather! ;)


If bladder snails ever figure out how to move onto land- watch out- we're doomed!
 
Breeding pest is easy but if you need a dedicated population a tank set just for that purpose works better than just letting them go in your tank. My dedicated tank out produces my regular tanks 5 to 1.
 
an alternative to a mesh filter bag that i've found works awesome is knee-high stockings. i got a box of black ones cuz my filters are black, and they fit nice and snug over the body of the filter, covering the intake perfectly while still allowing full intake, and they blend in completely. my husband didn't even realize i had anything on the filters at all. the snails love to hang out on the stocking, eating the food and plant bits that collect on the makeshift prefilter. (keeps the duckweed out of the filter, too lol) one has even laid a clutch of eggs right on it. ;)
 
Forgot pantyhose and I have it on a couple of my tanks too. Thanks for the addition.
 
The Zigman said:
I thought this was just gonna be..

1, get a tank.
2, add snails
3, add water
POOF a bazillion snails!
Click to expand...

It is. But Sounguru apparently likes to make entire articles out of things that could be explained in just a few sentences. He thinks he's the new Neale Monks.
 
No idea who Monks is but sounds like a nice guy....:)

There are some over looked factors to get the highest production and growth rate in a tank that was why I used more than one sentence....

Too some that have heavy demands on feeder snails just plunk and go doesn't produce enough to keep up. Not to mention tanks that hit the plateau in #'s or crash because of overlooked factors.
 
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