Nerite Snails

[badflash]

See this thread for background:
viewtopic.php?t=928&start=30
After 9 months, I can say with pretty good confidence that olive nerites will not breed in fresh water, period.

I've seen others that have bred them in brackish water. I currently have about a dozen in SG 1.018. I just dropped them in from fresh water. They closed up for about 3 days but are now moving around and eating normally. I did the same with the MTS snails that are now reproducing in this aquarium. Right now thay are eating up the BGA in this tank, but I do feed sparingly with agae flake food.

Once I see eggs I'll add salt water rotifers and algae to see if I can get some babies.

[Neonshrimp]

Hi badflash,

How big do the olive snail nerites get. I would like to have some in my tank if they are beneficial.

[badflash]

They get to be about 3/4". Very peacefull, but they leave hard to remove eggs everywhere.

[badflash]

After less than a week there is no trace of the BGA. These snails have eaten every bit of it. The glass is so clean that it looks like I took one of those magnetic scrubber to it.

[badflash]

I was told that Anacharis (Elodea densa) would do fine in strong backish water. I just put a few sprigs in my tank with a SP of 1.018 to see.

[badflash]

Mustafa is right once again. Te snails are having a feast with the now yellowing plants. I'm going to lower the salinity to 1.012 and try again.

[Neonshrimp]

Thanks badflash,

I was waiting on the updates on your plants in salt water conditions. Maybe they will servive better in 1.012, please update on this

[Mustafa]

Mustafa is right once again. Te snails are having a feast with the now yellowing plants. I'm going to lower the salinity to 1.012 and try again.

Thanks for the update! You might want to post this here:

viewtopic.php?t=1742&start=0

where it actually has a context.

The Egeria densa won't survive at 1.012 SG either, by the way.

[eraserbones]

Badflash --

Any news about your brackish-water experiments? I have some olive nerites in full seawater with phytoplankton, and they lay lots of eggs capsules... but I can't really tell if the capsules are even hatching.

[badflash]

Interesting. My olives are going strong, but I've yet to see any eggs or babies. Mine are also at full seawater, but they didn't do anything at lower concentrations either.

I think the larva are free swimming and don't look anything like a snail. They are also quite small, so one dayyou may just see some baby snails unexpectedly.

[Neonshrimp]

Good question eraserbones.

I would also like to know since I just got some nerite snails and would like to breed them also. Can the eggs be transfered to a saltwater tank set up just for hatching?

Thanks.

[eraserbones]

I've had my nerites in seawater for several months with no sign of baby snails. So I'd guess that there's some step I'm missing.

I haven't found any more info online about this species, but I've come across a few tantalizing details about other nerites. I'm starting to think that since many nerites live in the intertidal zone, the eggs may be waiting for tidal action (e.g. periodic drying or shifts in salinity) to hatch. Or, alternatively, I may have larvae and not know it, and there may be some similar cue that's necessary for them to settle. (I'm imagining, here, the larvae sloshing around in the open ocean, scouting out for a promising-looking rock. Perhaps my tank doesn't contain anything that registers as promising-looking.)

This is why I'm so curious about w/not the capsules are hatching -- it would help me know what the next step is. Maybe I can set up some kind of time-lapse monitoring of an egg capsule to get a better idea.

[Neonshrimp]

Will you be trying to vary the salinity and water movements?

I think the time-lapse monitoring of an egg capsule is a good idea and will tell us what works and what doesn't. Please let us know the results, thanks.

[badflash]

Here is some good info from another forum I belong to.
http://www.applesnail.net/phpBB2/viewto ... ght=nerite

The author is credible, so this isn't your typical post, and she shows her setup.

[Neonshrimp]

I just read the thread, thanks for the good info badflash. I think if hatching is to be achieved I will need to set up a small saltwater breeding tank for them.