How many MTS snails are too many?

[professorjimjam]

I have this tank 32.5G and as you can see in the photo, there are many malaysian trumpet snails and many pond snails.

once I heard from one of you that MTS is good for the tank as it moves the gravel and is beneficial.

now I do not know if this is too many and if it causes load to the tank. Or whether it is good or bad. I don’t know if I should remove some of them or how much of them. I would appreciate if you could share your experience with me. How much of them I need to keep .

also is pond snails beneficial like MTS ? Between the two which one of them is better MtS or pond snail? I got the pond snails for puffers but they reproduced as puffers could not eat them due to their hard shell and now I have a colony of both kind of snails.

appreciate your help.

 

[Redshark1]

I had this issue in two of my aquaria. Eventually I had a complete solution and now I have no pest snails.

In my planted 200 litre aquarium I was trying to reduce the population for many years. I had Malaysian Trumpet Snails and very small Ramshorn Snails. I could barely see through the glass even in daytime! Visitors used to comment. The only thing that worked for me was adding four Assassin Snails. Six months later all the pest snails were gone. I still have Assassin Snails but only ten or so are visible at one time. So, this was an amazing success for me.

In my 400 litre Clown Loach aquarium the Malaysian Trumpet Snails were mostly seen on the glass at night. They steadily increased in population. I put some Assassin Snails in there and my Clown Loaches ate the Assassin Snails! I saw them carrying them around and eating them. Unbelievable! You cannot always predict what will happen in this hobby! But luckily the Clown Loaches suddenly developed a taste for MTS and now they are all gone. They didn't start to eat them until after I added the Assassin Snails and they lived with the MTS until they were 27 years of age before they ate them. I also think they copy each other so all members of the group ate the MTS.

 

[Omrit]

They only cause additional load if they are all eating. For this many to be present I wager you are overfeeding? I would remove several by hand then cut back on food.

Unless this is a very old tank and you have just let the empty shells pile up for a long time. I don't like how it looks so I clean out the empty shells when they start piling up, but it isn't actually harmful.

Can add a group of assassins snails if you like, they are beautiful and a group will actually cause the MTS population to lower by noticeable margins.

 

[professorjimjam]

Thank you guys! I will get some assassins then.

 

[fishdance]

It only takes one MTS to jam a pump impeller and if you have a reasonable size fish room, they will colonise pipework, bottom drains, overflows. It doesn't take many snails to quickly multiply enough to affect water velocity and flow rates.

 

[professorjimjam]

I will get rid of the MTS then