Keeping Mystery Snails Alive

Mystery snails are only able to live in one of my tanks, while quickly dying off in the other two.  So, I've gone in search of an answer to this problem and here's what looks to be the problem: a lack of calcium.  Mystery snails require hard, neutral-to-alkaline water and as we've discussed in a previous thread, hard water is determined by its amount of dissolved calcium carbonate (CaCO₃). 

While my test kit indicates that my water is indeed very hard, an old acquaintance in a nearby neighborhood experienced the same problem with keeping snails and used vacation feeder blocks to remedy the issue.  How did that work?  I asked myself the same question and it turns out that these blocks add calcium to the water.  Another option would be to add a small piece of cuttlebone (the stuff for birds) or crushed coral to the filter.

And so I'm off to give it a try!  I'm down to one large mystery snail that seems impervious to any water conditions, but all of the small mystery snails died off.  The ramshorn snails, naturally, are doing just fine.  Those suckers never die. 

I'll report my findings soon!

 

Comments

[Kyle]

I tried snails with live plants and found that the snails just ate the plants. They would eat them off at the base and the whole plant would float up and clog the filter intakes. Snails did great in my tank though. They even spontaneously generated once. Never would clean the glass like I wanted them to.