zoos dying off

freddy949

freddy949

Member
I have a zoo rock and latley I been noticing that the number of zoos has been decreasing. The ones hat are still there are healthy but there are less of them. I have had the rock for almost a year now witout any problems.
My guess is that something is eating them. what eats zoos? latley I have een noticing these small round spiral snails that are very colorful they are purple almost checkered. Could these snails have something to do with my zoos decreasing in numbers?
Thanks
Freddy
 
hot883

hot883

Active Member
Originally Posted by freddy949
I have a zoo rock and latley I been noticing that the number of zoos has been decreasing. The ones hat are still there are healthy but there are less of them. I have had the rock for almost a year now witout any problems.
My guess is that something is eating them. what eats zoos? latley I have een noticing these small round spiral snails that are very colorful they are purple almost checkered. Could these snails have something to do with my zoos decreasing in numbers?
Thanks
Freddy
those snails are the reason. get em out or they will eat them all
Sundials I think they are called.
 
puffer32

puffer32

Active Member
Yep they ate some of my zoos, and can nestle in a colony and you can't even see them! Check them over very carefully, thought i got them all, but found one later, took the zoos out and did an iodine bath, to be sure i got them all.
 
freddy949

freddy949

Member
thanks guys
They look like the sundial pic but more colorful. I'll try to take a pic.
Also I noticed a bunch of small star fish appearing and tehy are multiplying in numbers. should I worry?
 
bonebrake

bonebrake

Active Member
The small starfish are most likely benign, but the snails on the zoanthids are bad news. There are several articles on this forum as well as on the internet if you do a search. You need to do a series of freshwater dips to get rid of those snails. Once you get rid of them, you need to keep a close eye on them to make sure that they do not return. Sometimes you kill all of the snails, but some of their eggs will survive the freshwater dips and you will have a reinfestation.
Good luck!
 
freddy949

freddy949

Member
ok i just plulled 19 of them out by hand here is a pic

some are black and white but some have otehr colors are they all sundial snails?
oh and i haven't seen them on my actual zoo rock
 
natureboy

natureboy

Member
I have what seems like hundreds of those snails in my tank. I have been told that they are harmless and it seems like they eat algae. My zoos are doing great.
 
puffer32

puffer32

Active Member
I can't tell by the pics if those are sundial snails. Go to the hitchicker thread, there are afew pics of them to compare them with. Did you pick them off your zoos? Mine were nestled in the zoos, pretty hard to see.
 
freddy949

freddy949

Member
i didn't find any snails in the zoos , most of them do not look like sundials maybe one or two. i have found sundial snails in my zooz before but i removed them and haven't seen them since. I guess i will just have to keep cheking my zoos.
 
javatech1

javatech1

Member
I found a lot of these in my sump and found out that they are good for the tank
Collonista are "mini-Turbo snails." They are seldom purchased by hobbyists, but are relatively common in reef tanks anyway, because they appear to hitchhike in on live rock or in some live sand. When hobbyists first see them, they presume them to be "baby" grazers of some sort. Instead, they have some of these animals. They reach a maximum adult size of about 1/4th inch (6 mm) in height and diameter. They are often tan to white and have mottled brown color patterns on the shell. They can be distinguished from all other Trochoideans by their small size and the presence of a small pit or hole in the center of the calcareous operculum that plugs the aperture. They reproduce well in aquaria, and are quite good grazers. If present in large numbers, they may effectively replace all other grazers in our systems.

http://www.gastropods.com/1/Shell_26361.html
 
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