mexican turbo snails

[westor40]

do any of the knoxville LFS have mexican turbo snails? I have been battling red cotton algae in my tank and just read a long post that suggested these snails as the best solution.

 

[donnyholland]

[violation]

 

[hesstondc]

I got some at the aquarium on papermill, not sure if they really eat the red stuff though...If cotton is the same as cyano....

I have always done water changes and sucked it up and eventually it went away due my macro eventually robbing the nutrients it needs...

 

[imsqueak]

Yea, both LFS have them. They are the reason I have ammoia spike! Both died at the same time in a 30g. What size is your tank?

Are you sure you are not rushing the tank's cyle?

 

[donnyholland]

lol yea they are big and if they die they put out some stink!!

/donny

 

[ct_vol]

Mexican Turbos don't like warm water... They're prone to dying...

 

[fishdoc11]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10556515#post10556515 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by ct_vol
Mexican Turbos don't like warm water... They're prone to dying...

Yep they are typically collected off the Baja peninsula from what I understand and cooler waters from the Pacific keep the area cool.
IME you are lucky to get 2 to live out of 10. They are great for hair algae if you can get them to live. Getting rid of the phophate source helps a lot more to get rid of hair algae though
Chris

 

[Runner]

I've picked up some from the Coral Reef before and the ones I got worked great on the red/purple cotton algae. They do not appear to be long-lived, though.

I think a refugium and a better skimmer did more to end my cotton algae problem for good now that the snails are all gone.

 

[donnyholland]

Man somebody really must not like me. My post get deleted so easy...


/d

 

[westor40]

Thanks for all the replies.
My tank is a 10 gal. It started out as a 20 g back in 2003. Did great for 3 years then all this cottony algae started showing up and many of the corals withered away. The two corals that survived the crash were transferred to the 10 gal last year. They're doing fine in the 10 gal but the cottony algae is still there. Wish I had room for a bigger tank.
I've bought snails from the local LFS but they don't look like mexican turbos (based on the pics I've seen).
Thanks again.

 

[fishdoc11]

Sounds like detritus built up in the sandbed of your old tank until you got "old tank syndrome". If you are using the same rock there is a good chance it wicked up lots of phosphate in the old tank and that's could be the source of your problems.