reef tank snails

[Rhodophyta]

These snails have been growing and reproducing in our reef tank for years now. They are good at combatting hair algae and slime algae even in cracks too small for other snails and they don't knock things over. The snail in the lower right of the photo with the calcareous tube worm growing on its shell is five years old. The snails start out black but gradually get coated with red or pink calcareous algae.


http://www.geocities.com/clevelandsaltwater/Btrumpet.jpg

The eggs are small clear spheres that you can
see in two areas of this photo. (Look for arrows.)

http://www.geocities.com/clevelandsaltwater/Btrumpeteggs.jpg

Anyone want to trade?

[Rhodophyta]

If you have something to trade and you are near NE Ohio, we can meet at the Cleveland Saltwater Enthusiasts Association next program March 15th. I might have it wrong, but I think the speaker is Tom Frakes, Editor of SeaScope, at the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo Aquatics Department. Be sure to check with me on that. I will try to find out for sure ASAP

[therman]

hmmm...can you get your pics working? i cant seem to view them.

interested in them though. ive been wondering why more people dont raise and sell/trade snails that breed in their tanks


-Tim

[Rhodophyta]

Hi Tim, thanks for the question. I think one part of it is that lots of the reef tanks out there have not been set up long enough or for long enough to raise marine snails. Or set up in a way that allows the snails to propagate. Our reef tank has been set up since the eighties. The snails grow slowly. A snail 1/3 grown can easily be two or three years old. Another reason is that most of the snails just don't propagate that easily. There are some snails that nearly everyone has propagated in their tank unknowingly. Those are the sessile "tube" that cement themselves to the reef and unwind their shell as it grows. We have also had limpets ( a snail relative) reproduce, but being able to repeat that success is not so easy. Getting the breeders may be the hardest part.

[mgk65]

Rhodophyta:

The pics did not come through.

I would be interested.

I live about 5 hours from Cleveland, so going to the 3/15 meeting is not good.

mgk

[Rhodophyta]

If the pics are not showing, there are two things that should pop them up. 1. Right click where the photo should be, then left click on properties. Copy the URL, paste it in your goto box and click go. The picture should appear by itself and then appear on this page when you click back to it. You would probably have to repeat for each photo. 2. Go to the club site in my signature and look them up under invertebrates in the photo file. I don't know whether restarting your computer or closing out extra windows would help, but it couldn't hurt. :)

[JB]

HI,
I have limpets reproducing by the hundreds, well there are lots of them anyhow. They are very small, from pinhead size, to maybe a 3/8 of an inch oval, being the biggest. And, belive it or not my counter current protien skimmer seems to be the perfect habitat for them. I am thinking that my 4 foot skimmer is a little inefficient LOL :)
You can see literally several dozen at any time of day, or night, on the inside of the tube. They eventually make there way up the output tube and into the tank.

Maybe I'll get some of your snails and throw them in the skimmer:)
How much for some snails?
Jason

[therman]

ok, finally managed to get the pics working

are those a species of cerith? they look similar, but its difficult to tell from the pictures. cerith eggs arent small clear spheres however, but rather whitish strings of eggs laid in a zigzag pattern on hard substrate, so maybe they arent.

i beg to differ about the snail propagation in reef tanks however. peppermint snails (not sure of nomenclature-a small brown and white scavenger species), ceriths, nerites, and particularly Stomatella spp. all reproduce to varying degrees in my system, which isnt very old (under a year), and is by no means an ideal environment for rearing the larve (heavily skimmed, with loads of powerheads). I've also heard of a number of species which reproduce in other peoples' tanks, particularly Strombus sp.

If a system was set up with a natural nutrient export system, so as to avoid skimming off larvae, and a minimal number of impeller driven pumps, I should think most snail species would be quite easy to reproduce in large enough numbers that trade among hobbyists would be possible. Maybe snails could end up on the list of organisms like sandbed detritivores and many corals, which, when setting up a new tank you can turn to a fellow reefer instead of buying wild caught animals from a fish store.

and yes, believe me....i notice vermetid snails in my tank....i almost wish i had a way to control them. little mucous nets all over my corals :(

how much were you wanting for the snails?

-Tim

[Rhodophyta]

Tim and Jason, it sounds like you both have lots of snail-oids reproducing in your reef tanks. We used to have limpets reproducing but lost them to a bad water change. I would be interested in trading with either or both of you for some of your snails/limpets. Yes, there should be more reproduction of something as "easy" as snails, but perhaps it's the short lifespan of hobby interest that makes many tanks unsuitable for reproduction. Maybe I see too many reef tanks setups on the internet auctions and in the classifieds of the newspaper, but it just seems like many people are in and out in a couple years or even less. Email me, guys! Mcdaphnia@msn.com and Mcdaphnia@lycos.com

[mgk65]

Tim, et. al.:

You said that nerites have reproduced in your tank. What type of eggs do they lay? I have some nerites and there are some unknown egg cases on my glass.

Here is a pic:

http://albums.photopoint.com/j/View?u=1545077&a=11713882&p=41658820

I have a very new tank; I do have some strombus snails which have laid eggs and they have hatched, but I don't know where they are.

A question: Do you guys have crabs or other predators? I just banished most of my crabs, only a couple left.

I wish I had something to trade with you guys. All I can offer is a little money and a great thanks!

mgk

[reefmanic]

I have these same snails in the hundreds in my tanks and they reproduce like rabbits.I sent some to Dr.Ron for an I.D a while back and he confirmed they where a cerith snail.I've never seen the zig zag egg pattern however I have noticed gelatinous like masses of a pinkish color on the sandbed,glass.They seem to have like 1-2 dozen eggs per mass too.I have to assume these are the snail eggs due to the fact that my sandbed looks like pepper sprinkled on it a few weeks after the egg masses disappear.The babies are not much bigger than a grain of sand then but then grow fast and move to glass and rocks.

Great to have in any reef IMO.

August

[Rhodophyta]

Thanks August, I've checked a few more places too and from behavioral descriptions it does sound like my snails are a type of or related to the cerith snails. The differences seem to be that they lay masses of clear eggs, and that they have a shiny black shell which acts as the perfect surface for calcareous algae.

[therman]

mgk-

those look like little coelenterates to me

baby anemones or hydroids of some sort is my guess

dont have a pic of cerith eggs at the moment. basically it is a white zigzag strand of eggs, ~3cm long and 1cm across.

i must have had 20 last week, but now they all seem to have hatched because i cant find a one. i'll try to remember to take a pic next time i see one.

-Tim

[Bubafat]

Those are hydroids, we have many of them growing in our class tanks. They multiply very rapidly, have a powerful sting, and have a much larger base then stalk.

Buba