The Puffer Forum

I saw the puffer guide, and the snail breeding guides that have been broken links for 2 years or more
library/feeding/feeding-your-puffers/
Searched google and didn't really find a whole lot as to getting rams from little to adult fastest as possible.


Right now my snail tank is a bare 5g with a aq10(with a prefilter)
76.3F
6.6pH
I somehow got a few cherries that hitchhiked into this tank, though there's only a few (maybe 5) they mostly hang out feeding off the prefilter.


I make sure to always have food in the tank so they are always able to eat, Fresh Spinach/Zucchini.

By luck, having the filter all the way on one side of the tank all the waste gathers up in one pile and takes 1 second to siphon out every 2nd day and a big glass of water (left out over night to let the chlorine evaporate) to top the tank back up.

Lights, I'm not to sure what the best settings for a bare snail farm would be... I'm not really sure if lights are even beneficial to ramshorns in anyway. I've been experimenting over the month with this a little... Tried leaving the lights on for 4 days, lots of water evaporating, lots algae on glass, lots of eggs. When I leave the light off for a week, no algae, clear water, not so many eggs... Need some input as for lights? What do you find the best way to go? I know the lights are not needed but we're going for more eggs/faster growing...

I'm picking up a cuttle bone (found in petstores near bird sections), for calcium, I believing this might be my answer to speeding up their growth. Input as for calcium for snails?


That's all I got right now, if you want photos I can easily provide them though I'm sure your imagination can handle a bare 5g with snails.

Ramshorns do not breed as prolifically as do common pond snails, but they have the potential of growing much larger more quickly than do common pond snails.

My personal experience with snails is that if you want lots of small snails, use common pond. If you need larger snails, use ramshorns.

To grow larger ramshorns you do need more water volume. Crowding stunts snails just as it does fish, but snails don't need nearly the water volumes that fish do. I have only used 10-15 US gallon tanks or larger to breed snails, so cannot comment on breeding in smaller tanks. For larger ramsforn, I move young snails int one of my veggie filter tanks (which vary from 15 to over 100 gallons), but most are 30-longs or 40-longs. A couple of dozen smallish ramshorns in sich a tank will grow quickly to ~1/2" size and usually then harvested as feeders. Growing to ~3/4 inch takes more than twice as long, and by then they have bred in the veggie filter. so their own young compete with them for food. Full size ~1 inch is very slow and not worth waiting for IMHO.

Do you know the GH and KH of your water supply? Your water at pH 6 is quite acid and likely too mineral-poor to be good for easy snail breeding. I would likely use and aragonite sand or crushed coral substrate to help harden the water and provide some minerals needed for the shells and growth. You could weigh down cuttlebone - which the snails will graze, but that can be expensive if you need lots of snails.

All of my snail-breeding and rearing tanks have had regular aquarium fluorescent lighting, 10-12 hours per 24 on timers. Algae is a basic food for snails. All their tank handling is the same as my fish tanks. At least 50% partials are done weekly, sometimes more if the water gets cloudy or has any aroma.

HTH

Not sure why I said it was a 5g, must of been to early in the morning for me to popularly function cause it's a 10g... None the less the stunning in small tanks make sense, I'd put them in with my crays (33g) but the crays make a quick meal out of them. I picked up a smallish cuttle bone since it was only $.99 but if it actually disappears to fast I'll switch to the crush crushed coral in a socking.

I also don't have a GH or KH test kit, never needed one for the rest of my tanks though I'm guessing the bone will give the water more minerals.

Thanks for the input RTR.

Just as a caution, if your source water is pH 6, you really really need liquid test kits for GH and KH. What you do not know can crash your tank.

The pH is a symptom. The GH and KH explain why.

Alright RTR, finally after a month of getting a new batch of rams they slowly died on me.... Really ticking me off so I went and picked up a liquid GH and KH kit.

I haven't seen any eggs since and they're not even eating or moving, well there's maybe 4 out of the 30 moving but the rest are just laying around.

7.4 pH
53.7 ppm KH
71.6 ppm GH

Ammo 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 10

50% w/c every 2 weeks.

I donno maybe I got a bad batch? What should I be doing to make them breed like bunnies? I mainly feed them zucchini, shrimp pellets but they haven't been eating in a very long time. My local pet store gave me some flaky looking stuff to try feeding them (sample) to see if they would eat that.

One last thing is I have maybe 3 cherry shrimps in that tank and they are doing fine, if my water was off I'd think they would be 1st to die.

Thanks for any help

Your water is as soft as mine and IME I have trouble breeding them too. Try adding 3 full cuttlebones to the tank. The cuttlebone may not neccessarily raise your KH and Gh (mine didn't) but the snails will absorb the calcium through their foot as they pass over it.

I'm actually considering adding more cuttlebone to see if my water params change.

Use *Edit* aragonite for substrate, and add a bit of baking soda to your water. Dissolve it first of course, and test the KH, you won't have to add much. You could probably find a chart online.

Alright time out...

Before I go dumping in baking soda and adding coral, what do I want levels for pH, KH, GH?

I have a KH of 4°, calcium rich diet, shells are nice and hard, breeding is prolific.This is still very soft, But I'm starting with an immeasurable amount super soft water.
There should be charts online that can help with with how much to add to raise to a certain level.
Keep your pH at least at 6.5. I'm not sure what the GH should be to best suit snails.
It's probably best to add *edit* aragonite as a substrate, that should keep everything at optimal levels, and won't need to be supplemented but every six months or so.

Ok...

Well my pH is above 6.5, it's actually 7.4(cause of the cuttle bone), So if I add Crush Coral wont it shoot my pH out the roof?

But my KH is a low to mid 3°(or 53.7 ppm KH)

It should buffer to about 8.0- 8.3 pH
You don't want a low pH, anything above 6.5 is fine, a higher pH of around 8.0 is probably ideal. 3° KH is still just a bit low, the tank I have at that has more brittle shelled snails. I try to keep my snail tank at 5° KH, but it's more often at 4°

Please, please do not add ANY commercial buffer to your tank. The only thing a buffer will do is mess up your water chemistry. The pH does not mean beans, it is only a symptom. What matters is the GH and KH.

Crushed coral is a poor agent to increase GH and KH. Aragonite is far, far better as it is more soluble. If you have to buy substrate, at least buy the right one. It should help, but is not fast.

Folks with soft acid water are better off using both aragonite substrate plus cuttlebone. The cuttlebone does not affect the water as much as it feeds the snails - it is soft enough that they can graze it and get theneeded minerals (Ca+, HCO3-) to buid shells.

Co-housing snails and shrimp frequently results in shrimp and no snails, as the shrimp can/may eat the snail eggs. One or the other but not both in the same tank. Some folks get away with both, but more do not. The shrimp are nutritionally okay if well fed, but the snails are not just food, they are need for dental plate wear.

*My mistake, I have seen crushed coral suggested here for buffering purposes, I have not personally used it.

Thanks RTR,

I'll pick up some Aragonite when I'm near the lfs today.

I'll give you a updated water test 2hours after I add the stuff to my tank.

cuttle bone is a god send for the shell structure.

If you want to up the breeding rate... increase the temp a tad and some surface agitation (air stone or sponge filter).


If you are going strictly for breeding and food I'd skip the substrate all together. A 100 snails poop like there is no tomorrow and the substrate traps that. Without plants to uptake that fertilizer, it is only polluting the tank.

You'd be surprised!

My first snail breeder tank had substrate... I wanted it to look like a "normal tank". Holy $h!t .. everywhere!!

From there I went just glass bottom and cuttle bone only. It makes water changes and cleaning much easier.