Fluke Tabs Safe   10/29/06
Are these "fluke tabs" absolutely safe for the fish?
Thanks.
< If used as directed they are deadly to invertebrates such as snails. If the snails are very numerous their decomposing bodies start a very strong ammonia spike that will affect the fish. Many people use this to treat Malaysian Burrowing snails. The snails are livebearers and make up most of the gravel. Then the tank is treated and the snails are all killed. Their bodies are high in protein. Buried under the gravel the bodies are being broken down by bacteria. The bacteria use oxygen and generate ammonia as waste. The combination is very bad for fish and when they have problems they blame the medications. I would recommend that you check for ammonia spikes when using any medications.-Chuck>

Snails, FW, sel., contr.   – 09/08/07
Hi crew,
The other day, Neale gave me some advice on keeping my sand 'safe' for my freshwater tank. It was suggested that Malayan livebearing snails would be good to keep the sand aerated and to eat debris, etc. It's just a small 6gal., and so far just two fish. So I've done some reading, but here's my questions.
If I get the Malayan snails, seems they'll reproduce prolifically; will they eat up all the algae? I'm worried that my Otocinclus won't have enough to eat if this happened. Also, being that they would reproduce so much, do they contribute to the bio or waste load much; or is it negligible? Thought I'd ask since my tank's so small. Lastly, would the water condition needs differ much from the Oto?
Thanks so much!
Vanessa
<Hello Vanessa, Malayan livebearing snails (Melanoides spp.) do have a bad reputation among some aquarists, while others consider them a blessing. I fall into the latter camp. Here's why. Melanoides turn organic material into snails. They don't eat gravel, they don't eat sand, and they don't eat live plants or fish, EVER. So if the Melanoides are multiplying, they only do so because there's "stuff" in the tank for them to eat. That might be uneaten food, it might be decaying plant leaves, it might be a dead fish, or it might be algae. Provided you keep the tank free of those things, the snails won't multiply very much because they can't. In a clean tank where all they have to eat is algae and tiny amounts of organic detritus, they just don't become a problem. They may be breeding, yes, but they're dying too, so you end up with a more or less steady population. It's in messy tanks where people have inadequate filtration and overfeed their fish and don't remove dead plant leaves that the snails become problematic. Even in large numbers though, they don't do any harm, and removing them isn't especially difficult. You can buy little snail traps for about $5-10 (it's called the JBL "Limcollect") and you could use one of these every six months or so if you thought things were getting out of hand. Some folks make their own lobster pot-type traps from small plastic cartons and the like. Since the snails crawl onto the glass at night, it isn't difficult just to turn the lights off early one night, and then wait for the snails to emerge, and then scrape them off with a net or suck them up with your siphon. It's no big deal. But really, I leave them to their own devices. No, they won't out-compete you algae-eating catfish, and no, they don't add much to bioload on the filter. On the plus side, they ensure there's no anaerobic decay in the tank and they help aerate (if that's the word) the substrate encouraging good plant growth in the same way earthworms do on land. They are also very good "early warning" monitors: if you see them on the glass in the daytime making a bee-line for the surface of the tank, it means you have a problem. As far as water chemistry goes, they're not fussy. In soft/acid water they tend to reproduce very slowly, which may or may not be a good thing depending on your needs. I'll also add that they are extremely pretty little animals. Take a look at one close-up: they have beautifully sculpted shells with red and purple markings. If they were rare and difficult to keep, aquarists would covet them... but because they're so easy to keep, we scorn them. Strange. I hope this helps, Neale.>