Hello?

[molluscsandmonsters]

Is anyone still here? Looks like the most recent post was made in 2012. I hope joining and posting here isn't a faux pas like thread necromancy on forums.

Anyway, I have a planted 30 gallon full of ramshorns and nothing else at the moment, which is a recent upgrade from a planted 2.5 gallon full of ramshorns and nothing else, because I'm a dork who likes snails. I used to keep cory cats, bettas, and goldfish, in addition to many other snails, and I may yet do so again. (Aside from the goldfish. I am done with goldfish. They're wonderful fish, but I no longer have the space or the energy.) Hi.

Comments

[molluscsandmonsters]

Oh jeez, that sounds like a nightmare. I'm sorry. Are you from California? I know a couple people from California whose wildfire stories are terrifying.

Tetras and danios are nice, but I LOVE cory cats. They're built like little tanks, but they're chill and sociable, which is a great combination. They come in so many different patterns too! I haven't kept any in a long time though, because the way I lost my last ones was kinda rough (though definitely not as rough as your whole house burning down). There was some kind of metal poisoning issue with our tap water, the kind of thing that makes humans sick too, and we didn't find out until the damage was done.

That said, I did use sand for the snail tank with the thought that I might like to have cories again some time.

And yeah, if you can't tell from the name and icon, I love snails. It's just the rams for now, but come spring, depending on my financial situation, I'd like to add a mystery snail or two (P. diffusa, sometimes also ID'd as P. bridgesii) and, maybe, if I'm lucky enough to find a local breeder, one of the Sulawesi rabbit snails (Tylomelania spp). I also have a land snail! It's a grove snail, Cepaea sp. (probably nemoralis?). Their name is Pocket. But I like the aquatic snails best. Tragically a lot of my favorite snails are intertidal species, which makes them poor choices for pets...

[codyne]

Yes, I'm in California. We've had a couple of bad wildfires here where I live. My place survived the first one but the second one got it. Fortunately we had enough time to evacuate, and I got myself and my mom and kitties out safely, but sadly there was no way to evacuate the fish. When I got back the place was burned to the ground. All that was left of the fish tank was a pile of the gravel. I miss my big goldies but having a tank that big was a lot of work. I couldn't keep tropicals here, though -- I've got solar electricity and it can't handle keeping a tank heater running overnight. The good thing about goldfish was that they didn't need a heated tank, and the well water was good pH for them.

I love cories, too. I tried adding them to my goldfish tank but they never survived for long, so I gave up trying. I don't know what the problem was, maybe it was just too cold for them, although I kept the room heated so it didn't get really cold.

Mystery snails are cool, I've thought about getting one or two of them for a tank some day. We'll see what happens after I move. I will have to see whether there are any fish stores in the area and what's available.

Sorry about losing your cories -- that's the thing about having fish, you are responsible for their total environment, and so many things can go wrong that you can't even see until it's too late. It can be very discouraging sometimes. I remember when I first got my goldfish -- they were just those little ten-cent feeder fish, I had no idea they were going to grow up to be over a foot long! I started them in a 10-gallon, then moved up to 25 gallon, then 80, then finally to 150 when I moved here. When they were in the 25-gallon, the water was nice and clear and I changed it often and thought everything was fine... until I thought to test the ammonia level one day and it was at pretty much lethal levels. So I went and bought the 80-gallon tank. Even that was hard to keep the pH from dropping, although I was doing weekly water changes. My apartment building had a water softener, so the water came out neutral but started to drop almost immediately. So I decided to go with a 150-gallon tank when I moved.

How do you keep your land snail? Do you have a terrarium for it? That sounds interesting, I'm not sure I've heard about anyone keeping land snails for pets.

[molluscsandmonsters]

Oh, yeah, don't put cories in a goldfish tank. Cories are tropical, and also a goldfish will try to eat anything that looks like it might fit in their mouth.

Keeping aquatic pets is kind of like having a whole tiny ecosystem as a pet. That's one of the coolest and most rewarding things about it, but it's also a little terrifying sometimes. A dog is dependent on you for food, shelter, and socialization, but typically not breathable air. All you can do is do the research and try your best to provide a good home.

And yeah, they do have a terrarium, but they need an upgrade actually. I did have them in a reasonably nice little setup in an old minibow, but there wasn't a good way to secure the lid properly and they actually escaped for a while. Land snails are stronger than you'd think! So now I have them in a little critter keeper, and it's... fine? But it'd be better to have something bigger, with more stuff to climb on or hide under, and maybe some live plants. Right now I have to change the soil more frequently because of the size of the container, and while grove snails are not... the most neurologically advanced of pets, they do roam around a fair amount in the wild and prefer to burrow under things or stick on trees when resting/hibernating/aestivating, so a larger, more decorated container would probably be healthier for them.