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I currently am having issues with snails. They hitchiked into my tank and now they're trying to take over. I take them out when I can find them, but is there some way that I can easily get rid of them without emptying the whole tank?

Snail poison is an extreme last resort. You don't want to go there.

First thing you try to do is bait and take'em out. One way to do so is to put in a lettuce leaf overnight. The next day, there should probably be snails on it. Take out the leaf, throw it away, and put in a new one to get more. Do this over and over again until satisfied. Any similar sort of food-bait and dispose thing should work as well as long as the food stays together long enough for snails to collect on it.

The alternative is to get a snail-eating fish. Loaches are mostly very good at snail-eating, especially the Botias. At least, that's what people say. A trio of Yoyo loaches (Pakistani Loach, if I'm not mistaken, is their other name...) should do the trick; I say Yoyos because they don't get that large compared to, say, the Clown Loach.

If you don't want snails ship it to me xd lolz...I keep loosing snails in my tank. Oh yeah...I have loaches >.> *chuckles*

I agree with Metagon about the loaches. They are very proficient at getting rid of snails. That's what we use to get rid of the snails at the store. But I disagree about the clown loaches. They do get big, but it takes many many years before they get even a decent size. Clown loaches are very slow growing and, at least I think, are the best snail eaters. 3nodding

We use large goldfish.

I don't want her to buy a fish that she's not going to be happy with in her tank though. Even though it might solve a temporary problem, she's going to have to take care of the fish for the rest of its life. confused


My only problem with snails is they produce SOO much waste. I've got 3 small snails I pulled from my tank and haven't yet had the heart to kill and even though they've had no food supply they've produced a thin layer of feces at the bottom of the container. Worst of all, the mystery snails I had had this nasty sticky stuff that couldn't be gravel vacuumed. confused (My mom horribly overfed them as well, exacerbating the problem.)

It's true that Clown Loaches are proficient snail eaters and that they are slow growers, however if someone has no desire at all to set up a 6' tank, even if it is in the distant future, I say to go for other loaches only because there are alternatives than to have to trouble with finding large Clown Loaches better homes later. That's just my opinion, though...

Oooh! Snails! I have one named Cornelius ^_^v

I think the only way to fix the problem is to be heartless. I worked at a Pet Store and we would put them in a bag with some fruits and veggies. They'd multiply in there and we'd throw them away. I don't know if you could do it if you feel sorry for them... I know I was always sad when we had to do this gonk

So... If I were thinking about getting a loach to eat all the snails, is there any type that stays fairly small (all I have is a 20 gallon tank)?