sand snifting shells (snails) useful or pointless?

floods7

floods7

Member
I have two sand snifting shells or maybe they are called sand snifting snails. Is there any point to having these? I feel like they just eat the small organisims that the fish need? Plus I have a mandarin goby which feeds on some of these small organisms. Should I get rid of the sand snifters?
I have two of them in a 30g.
 
woody189

woody189

Member
Quote:
Originally Posted by floods7 http:///t/392161/sand-snifting-shells-snails-useful-or-pointless#post_3480703
I have two sand snifting shells or maybe they are called sand snifting snails. Is there any point to having these? I feel like they just eat the small organisims that the fish need? Plus I have a mandarin goby which feeds on some of these small organisms. Should I get rid of the sand snifters?
I have two of them in a 30g.
You should't have a mandarin in that small tank. They need copepods (small oragnisms that the fish eat) and a lot of them. The mandarin will deplete the pod population and starve. Sand snails aren't bad, good actually. I don't think they eat pods, only stuff you don't want on the sand bad like uneaten food.
I would keep the snails and ditch the mandarin. sorry.
 
woody189

woody189

Member
well that's good. I've never had a mandarin and I love the way they look but never bought one because from everything I've read, they say they need an established tank w/ an endless supply of pods. I'm assuming yours has been "trained" to eat processed food. Now that I think of it, I think wild mandarins are a no-no in smaller aquariums, and tank raised are iffy (but i guess you got one that'll eat non-live food). I think that's the only way they can survive if there's not enough pods.
I'm glad he's working out.
 
floods7

floods7

Member
Actually I have a pretty established tank plus I feed live brine every other week which he likes. So maybe that's why he's doing good.
 
btldreef

btldreef

Moderator
Quote:
Originally Posted by floods7 http:///t/392161/sand-snifting-shells-snails-useful-or-pointless#post_3480716
Actually I have a pretty established tank plus I feed live brine every other week which he likes. So maybe that's why he's doing good.
That's exactly why he's doing well, but you really should get him trained to eat frozen if you can. As he grows, he's going to require more and more food and it gets hard to keep up with a full size mandarin. Think of them as "hummingbirds of the sea." Their metabolism is always working.
Anyways, as mentioned, sand sifting snails are beneficial. They eat the left over fish food and clean the sand of detritus. They're not like sand sifting fish that eat the beneficial fauna out of the sand.
 
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