starting a snail colony as a feeding supplement

I suggest you skip the sand- it'll just be a hassle when you're trying to harvest critters- and replace the ghost shrimp with red cherry shrimp. They're not native, but they are easier to breed (I'm told, haven't tried yet myself) and less predatory. Their smaller size and bright color also makes them irresistable to fish.

I personally don't find the sand to be any problem at all and is a good source of food for shrimp/snails they pick thru it all day.

Cherry shrimp are a good suggestion though instead of glass shrimp.

Cherries are a lot easier to breed and a lot prettier to look at. You can start a cherry shrimp colony with just a few adults and in 3 months you will be pushing 100 or so if you set it up right. The colony will double about every 3 months after that.

Cherry shrimp setup:
10 gallon
Sand
Some rocks and wood
Java Moss (more the merrier)
sponge Filter
Temp 74-78
PH 7.2-7.8

Now the trick is to not over feed the shrimp. you should only feed them once every 3 days and lightly at that or you can keep them with the snails but they won't breed as fast. Cherries are real prone to kick off or slow down breeding in high nitrates. They will also keel over with just the smallest amount of ammonia, so make sure the tank is cycled before adding shrimp.

I recommend a fishless cycle or use a pre-cycled sponge filter.

Nice thing is if any of the shrimp survive entry into the bigger tank and manage to make it to cover you could have them breeding in the tank with the fish and provide a small food source at all times. I had a small colony surviving under a piece of driftwood in my dwarf Cichlid tank.

Also harvesting the shrimp is easy and I can show you how to build a trap so you don't have too chase them around.

Sorry inverts are one of my passions. I can also get you starter colonies of Bladders, Rams, Mts, and cherry shrimp if you want them.

Edited by sounguru, 14 January 2010 - 01:39 PM.

When my tank was new I had alot of those bladder snails that snuck on with a few store bought plants. When i added fish they quickly vanished, shiners love eating them.

I have had massive snail outbreaks in tanks with low ph and hardness. I do not add anything and they seem to reproduce like crazy! All of my tanks have live plants, I think that helps as they eat dead/dying leaves.
Populations go down when I have added snail eating fish. My sunfish seem to gobble up MTS as well as any other small snail.
Snails the size of a dime or larger seem to be left alone by the fish.
I have 2 gallon planted jars for breeding shrimp. The snail populations seem to be doing just fine in them. The ph in the jars is about 6.6. If I fed them more I bet they would greatly increase. Their shells are very easy to break because of the lack of calcium. I am thinking that it would be all that much easier for fish to eat them.
I am breeding cherry shrimp in one jar and orange bee shrimp in the other. A ten gallon would support a lot of these! I use about 1 inch of organic potting soil with a low npk rating covered with 3/4 inch of well rinsed play sand. I plant heavily with trimmings from my other tanks. My nitrates, nitrites, and ammonia are always 0. I do not use a filter. I do not use a heater either, so during the winter my shrimp stop reproducing. If the temperature in your house goes below 70 much, I would use a heater to keep them reproducing.

Edited by Elijah, 16 January 2010 - 11:28 AM.

Snail culture fail.

I setup a 10 gallon with some creek sand and small fw clam shells, a sponge filter and a heater set for 72-74 degrees. Cycled the tank and added some snails from my lfs. I later caught more snails and a bunch of scuds. I left them in the bucket for a few days to acclimate to room temp then acclimated them to tank temp and chemistry very slowly. After a few days the scuds starting dropping then the snails. After about a week, most all but very few died. I thought maybe it had something to do with our copper pipes. I bought the API copper test and it showed 0, not even the slightest tinge of yellow. I use only cold water and treat with stresscoat/tapwater conditioner. Here were my test results after my invert massacre.

ph 7.4
ammonia 0
nitrite 0
nitrate 5-7
kh 2
gh inconclusive
copper 0

So I gotta say, what up with that?

Edited by bart, 13 February 2010 - 09:42 PM.

Snail culture fail.

Don't question a gift from God. You have been truly blessed.

I setup a 10 gallon with some creek sand and small fw clam shells

Would this be "small fw clam shells" from clams that you knew to be dead before you put them in this small tank, or ""small fw clam shells" that you believed to be alive when you put them in this small tank?

dead. These were split up like you find on the beach or in my case, a river bank.