Pyramidellid snail habits?

[Lyn]

I see a bunch of small pyramid shaped snails on the rocks that look like they are eating algae. Do the infamous tridacnid eating pyramidellid snails graze on rocks? There are no tridacnid clams in this low light tank.

Could this be a benign type of pyramid snail? The only other spirally shaped snails that I purposely put in the tank are cerith snails. Are these known to multiply in the tank?

Has anyone else had tiny pyramid-shaped snails that were not the clam eating type?

I am not happy about this discovery. The vast majority of my Strombus snail population is in this tank, and the only thing I can think of to get rid of pyramidellids is a snail eating wrasse. Any other suggestions?

 

[Elite]

I don't think they eat algae. I think you have baby ceriths.

 

[Lyn]

I really hope you are right

 

[Pianotips@hotmail.com]

I like baby snails!

 

[Lyn]

Pianotips,

Until they can be identified (I'll try to post a picture, but they are small, and I don't have a great camera) I won't chance you getting the infamous Pyramidellid. You won't want those.

How about some Strombus snails instead? I can definitely identify those, and I also have smaller populations of them in other tanks w/o ick.

 

[Pianotips@hotmail.com]

LOL .. why thank you.. that would be nice. I just like snails..At feeding time, the nassarius sails pop up from the sandbed. Me and my son make a point to watch them..

 

[Lyn]

Yes, they are fun. Do you have the little ones, or the jumbo Nassarius? Those are like bulldozers.

 

[Lyn]

These are the best pictures I could get. Can anyone ID them?

 

[Lyn]

Oh, and they are also nocturnal. When I put the tank light on to photo them, they started heading back to the sand.

 

[Pianotips@hotmail.com]

hahaha bad or not.. they look pretty cool

 

[Lyn]

I am going to answer my own question. I did some searching around on Wetwebmedia and found out that:

!. Pyramidellids are parasitic and die without a clam host.
2. Ceriths readily breed in aquariums.

Since this tank has never had Tridacnid clams, and since I have Ceriths... I am assuming that Phong is right! I will wait until they grow out a bit before offering them to BAR.

Pianotips, you may get some of these babies eventually too.

 

[glee]

i have the same snails in my tank, but they do not get any bigger than a grain of uncooked rice.

 

[Lyn]

Too bad, I was hoping they would be Ceriths. Oh well, better than Pyramidellids!