how can i get rid of snails

Hi everyone
I want to know how to get rid of snails without desturbing the bristlenose

High mitch-man, I've been told that really the only to get rid of snails (properly) is take your fish out of the tank and treat the tank with high doses of chlorine- retreat a week later to get any juvies that have hatched from eggs, the only draw back to this method is you'll end killing off your bio-organisms in the filters etc, so you'll have to spend the next month getting your tank back to normal to re-introduce your fish.
But it will work well.
J

Thanks Kurosaki J i will have to try it some time soon before my tank is over run by snails.

Rather than dousing with chemicals, get a goldie pleco (aka sunshine). I got one for my sister and within 2 nights she went from in excess of 1000 ramshorns to not a single one. Now she puts a few in each night to feed it. Far better as she doesn't have to take any fish out and there is no poisonous effects.

Good Luck....

no need for chemicals just get some assasin snails they eat all the others then just get rid of em before they start breeding

Funnily enough, these assasin snails are like hens teeth in OZ- I definately go with that option if you can find the snails.
J

their always on ebay i got them off their last year after buying a second hand tank and setting it up within weeks their was loads of snails put the assasin snails in and they were all gone within 3 weeks

Where can I find the goldie plec

Hi, clown loaches love snails, any size/type. They live well in my community tank. Can grow rather large but my 8yr old is only 15cm and seems to be staying at that size. I even keep a breeding tank full of snails and harvest them for the clownies! You're definitely better trying a natural solution than chemicals.

Yoyo Loaches and Skunk loaches eat snails. I'm stealing the pair off my godfather soon, as my tanks getting overrun with the little pests lol!

i'm not saying this works for everyone but if you take the fish out, then clean your tank outside, take all the water out and the snails will die because they have not water. while the tank drys out go search your plants for snails and kill them. it works for me every time so give it a try.

rinoh wrote:

i'm not saying this works for everyone but if you take the fish out, then clean your tank outside, take all the water out and the snails will die because they have not water. while the tank drys out go search your plants for snails and kill them. it works for me every time so give it a try.

um but of like me you have a 5 foot planted tank with 8 discus + lots of plecos this is not possible
So I dumped in some assassin snails and they've now laid eggs so give it a couple of months and i'll have babies and then an army of the AS

Don't worry to much about assasin snails. They don't breed like other snails. We had a 2 footer tank that was snided with snails, as well as other tanks. Put in a couple of small assasin snails and you could literally see the unwanted snails running for the hills. Took a coupla weeks for them to clear it up, but they did

Did a water change in my sons tank today and counted over 30 baby assassin snails

Jagtazman wrote:

Did a water change in my sons tank today and counted over 30 baby assassin snails

Now thats a result

They are definitely a snail that can be found homes quickly, and cover their cost

I could do with some more for the 3 ft and 5ft tanks, just noticed another batch of eggs so looking good

I tried Clown Loaches to get rid of my snail issue i had a few years ago. The loaches are so lazy that they did nothing ended up draining the tank down. I did however remove the juwel filter I had (tank is a rio 180) and now use an Eheim external filter which gives the small snails no place to hide and and havent seen an for well over 12 months.

I dont mind a few snails. Theyre good at helping with clean up.

but when they get overpopulated...I either knock them all to the bottom manually and grab handfuls out and feed them
to my Yellow Labs (cichlids). Or I shift the fish around so the Labs end up in the snail infested tank. I dont know if
Yellow Labs are known for eating snails...but the ones I have sure do a really good job at it.

I have ramshorn snails which I dont mind and then I got those %^&%&^ pond snails. Those are the ones I hate. They
really overpopulate in a hurry.

Darren Balch wrote:

I tried Clown Loaches to get rid of my snail issue i had a few years ago. The loaches are so lazy that they did nothing ended up draining the tank down. I did however remove the juwel filter I had (tank is a rio 180) and now use an Eheim external filter which gives the small snails no place to hide and and havent seen an for well over 12 months.

baby clown loaches are superb at cleaning up snails but when thet get older they loose interest and get lazy I tend to sell them then and get new babies

Jagtazman wrote:

rinoh wrote:

i'm not saying this works for everyone but if you take the fish out, then clean your tank outside, take all the water out and the snails will die because they have not water. while the tank drys out go search your plants for snails and kill them. it works for me every time so give it a try.

um but of like me you have a 5 foot planted tank with 8 discus + lots of plecos this is not possible
So I dumped in some assassin snails and they've now laid eggs so give it a couple of months and i'll have babies and then an army of the AS

Thats great news on the assassins, as they are reported not to breed to readily and are worth a good few quid each.

I had a big snail problem which wasnt helped by the fact i originally had a juwel internal filter which is a veritable snail sancutary. I purchased 2 clown loaches based upon the advice of the LFS. They hid for weeks and i assumed that they had both died as i couldnt find them anywhere? So determined to continue i purchased 4 more based on the advice and to my amazement the next day i had 6 clowns? I guess thst shows that you should keep them in small groups of around 5 as a minimum. Anyway, i upgraded to an Ehiem external filter which gave the snails nowhere to hide and observed the smallest clown loach becomming an expert snail eating machine. The other 5 clowns tended to mug him for his snails once he had cracked the shells as they are quite lazy. I guess the outcome is the story is if your tank allows space for a small group of clown loaches then they are certainly my recommendation. Maybe i'm old fashioned but why dose the tank with chemicals if you dont need to. The added benefit of the clown in my small group is that they are very entertaining to observe as they have a rather startling habbit of playing dead for no reason and like to all squeeze into tiny spaces overing to sleep which often results in more than one fish upside down asleep in the morning. Its also worth mentioning that most text will tell you that Clowns will grow to well over 12 inches in length, i've had mine for 3 years now and the biggest is only 4 inches long. They are slow growing so in my 180l tank there is plenty of space for my pair of bristlenose plec, sailfin plec, clown plec, 12 Corys and various tetras. Clown loaches tend to eat anything you throw at the them, from flakes, frozen bloodworms to sinking pellets & courgette. When they eat they will click audibly which can be heard from other rooms in my house! They prefer a sandy or small loose gravel substrate as they like to dig and generally poke about. Just one note of caution they do have a spine under each eye which they use when threatend so netting and handling is sometimes a problem. Most LFS are aware of this but i would insist on double bagging them just to be sure. I try to catch mine using a clear plastic tub and coax them into it. These loaches as with most catfish it is essential to consider the suitability of any chemical treatment before administering. Clowns do have a reputation to be susceptible to Ich, however when nessecary i use Protozin by Waterlife in conjunction with a 2 degree temperature rise for the treatment period to great success. Didnt mean this to turn into an essay, sorry guys. Hope it helps.

Assassin snails

Just a follow on from some of the points above - I have 4 apple snails (which I would like to keep), a ramshorn that was an "freebie" with my shrimps, and have possibly just made the mistake (?) of buying 6 trumpet snails for my 100 litre tank, as I had read that they help with aerating the substrate.

At the moment, I don't have a snail problem, but have read that ramshorns and trumpets can get out of hand - I'm not sure which type of snails were the problem in this original thread?

A couple of times I have seen loaches at my local fish store, but when I asked they said loaches couldn't be kept with bristlenoses as they might attack them.

Given that this is a bristlenose forum, and several people have mentioned that they have used loaches to control snails, was my fish store advisor giving me incorrect advice? can some loaches and bristlenoses live together peacefully?

I would never have a ramshorn snail in the tank!

I have kept loaches in all my tanks at some point, while some can be ok with pleco's and in community tanks...

some loaches can become territorial around food, some can eat small fry.....

as with many other fish habits and characteristics can vary greatly......

I only tend to leave loaches in while the snails are keptunder control, I then move my loaches to a tank with more mature or adult pleco,
I play safe to the idea that the older ones can control them better and also move out of the way alot more quickly than young fry
good luck...