BIG snail problem in fish tank............HELP?

Question

I have a fresh water aquaium, and i have a HUGE snail problem. I accidently bought some live plants that had snail eggs on them and did not know it. I have tryed everything to get rid of them, including, soaking everything in bleach water, to NO AVAIL. I have even tryed some stuff called Had-a-snail. All it does is bring the live ones to the surface, BUT DOES NOT KILL the EGGS.
HELP. This has been going on now for at least 8 mo. I'm afraid that if i can't find a solution to this problem that i will have to shut my tank down for good.
PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, HELP ME

I have drained the tank and THOUGHT i got everything clean. I even put fresh rock in, that i knew DID NOT have any snails,or snail eggs in it. NOTHING has worked.

Answer 1

http://www.tfhmagazine.com/default.aspx?pageid=337

Answer 2

Yes it is a hard thing to get rid of snails. But if you get some good stuff from a proper aquarium shop it should do the trick. You don't have to shut your tank down for good. Just take everything out and give all a thorough cleanse and let it all dry out for a while in the sun and that should do it. But snails aren't that bad are they?? They clean the glass and I just squash the ones that come to the surface and the fish go crazy for them, they love the protein lunch.

Answer 3

You can do any of the following:
1. Get a Clown Loach, Chinese Algae Eater, or Bristle-nosed Catfish. Either of these would eat any snail that'd come around.
2. Get a lettuce floating in the water surface. Snails will attach to it in no time. Then you can throw them or crush them down to pieces.
3. Use Tetra or Sera Snail Control Solution. Remove your fish first then put a few drops in your aquarium water. Follow the directions indicated in your solution bottle.
4. Remove all water, gravel and plants and start all over with new substrate, plastic plants, and fresh tap water.

Answer 4

Okay, your solutions depend on the type of fish that you have and the size of the aquarium. First, I would research types of snail eating fish that work with the size of your aquarium and the types of fish that you keep. Some loaches, like weather (dojo) loaches, are great snail eaters and they will even dig in the gravel/substrate to get to them. Weather loaches are also friendly fish, and they do will in cooler water with goldfish and also in warmer water with tropicals (but only up to the upper seventies). If you have a large enough aquarium, you can try a freshwater puffer, but you have to be willing to keep them in their very specific water parameters, and you have to make sure not to get nippy ones (like dwarf puffers) who will shred the fins of your fish. Some snail eating fish will help keep the population under control, but you will also have to do the tediousness of sneaking up to your aquarium with a flashlight at night to scrape the snails off of your aquarium walls and plants with a net.
I suggest these two things to keep the snail population under control, because as far as I know your only other option after trying these, and everything else you've tried, is to tear down the aquarium, boil and/or bleach everything including your aquarium itself, and throw out all of your plants. And, unless you have a good sized hospital tank or other tank laying around, this means your fish will be homeless. Unfortunately, I have no idea how to kill the eggs without tearing down your aquarium, because unless you are finding egg sacks, the eggs could be anywhere. But, if you can keep the snail population under control, they can actually be a nice addition to the aquarium.
Edit: Also, some people forget that snail eggs can get into their filtration systems too.

Answer 5

This might or might not work for you but I guess it couldn't hurt to try... I had the exact same problem and threw in some Ich medicine; two days later they were all dead except two! I don't know what kind of snails you have in your tank though because mine were just those small tadpole snails, and I did some research and they don't harm anything in the tank at all in reasonable numbers. They don't eat live plants or harm fish, they just eat muck off of the glass and leaves.

Answer 6

Float some lettuce in the tank. They'll accumulate on it very quickly. Take it out and get rid of it. Keep doing that till you don't see anymore, may take awhile to get all of them though. I'd get the pond snails from the pet store for free for my puffer fish. I'd put them in a container with lettuce for food for them till it was time to feed them to puff. I could not get those buggers to reproduce no matter how hard I tried. Even tried putting them into a fish tank, nothing.

Don't use unnecessary chemicals like ich treatment, it'll just stress the fish. And don't break down your tank and scrub/clean it. You'll kill off the beneficial bacteria in there, and you're tank will have to cycle all over again.

Answer 7

in case you overwhelmed one, it grew to become into probable a pond snail, no longer a Malaysian trumpet snail, their shells are problematic. There are a pair of non-chemical concepts, which you will probable prefer to attempt, with the aid of fact snail chemical ingredients are problematic on crustaceans(shrimp) and kuhlis. Yoyo loaches are heavily bearing directly to clowns, in shape and nutritional behavior, yet don't get as vast, often around 4 inches in aquariums. Supposedly they could arise to 6 inches, yet i've got been holding them for over twenty years and have in no way considered one over 4-one million/2. some will consume them if there rather hungry, some a so-so, and a few bypass ballistic till they have killed and eaten each and every snail they could locate. in case you get 3 or 4 you will probable get one snail fiend. they are relaxing to observe, too. murderer snails are yet another selection. purely like their call shows, they are predatory snails that prey upon different species of snails. they are lots tougher to stumble on nonetheless, particularly in case you're actually not in a huge city. in some cases people on boards have them and are prepared to commerce or sell some..

Answer 8

I found this link that contains many helpful hints on controlling freshwater snail populations... I especially liked the idea of introducing freshwater fish into the tank that eat the snails. Hope this helps.
http://www.drhelm.com/aquarium/snails.html

Answer 9

I have had that problem before and I wasn't able to get rid of them either. I tried cleaning out the fishtank, I even washed it several times and they still came back. Honestly .. I would just get another fishtank with all new stuff. But the snails are a good thing to have in the fishtank, it's just that when there gets to be too many of them .. it's kinda gross looking. Good Luck.

Answer 10

Try non-iodized aquarium salt which could kill certain types of snails.Or may be some types fish medication.Pearl gouramies also eats aquarium snails. ( and don't pour bleach water into the aquarium!!!)

Answer 11

Snail Problem In Fish Tank