# Assasin Snail Question



## zfarsh (Apr 7, 2011)

Hi everyone,

I seem to have inherited a baby Assasin Snail. Must have been from the last batch of plants i bought, though i think i had driped them in Hydrogen Peroxide, but i didnt do my regular Potassium Permanganate. Anyways, it is still a baby, but it is in my RCS tank with my spixi snails, MTS, and even some elephant snails until i can find them all to relocate them, and some of my extra Ramshorn Snails.

I have never had an Assasin Snail, so not yet sure what to do with it. Does it eat anything other than snails? I mean can it regular fish food, and if there is food, will it leave the other snails alone?

I was even considering puting it in my 75 gallon tank which has spixi, and nerites, but will it attack the Nerites if it ever finds them?

I was thinking of keeping it in case i one day had an outbreak of ramshorns or spixis, as i dont have any predators right now for taking care of them, and dont plan to have them either. I was hoping more for the baby spixi, not the adult ones, just to keep number in check, though not crucial at this time as i am try to grow my numbers alot in my other tanks. Maybe this is not a good reason. At least, i know it cant reproduce by itself, right?

NOtE This Snail must have been in my tank for a few tanks now, and none of the Adult Spixis have attacked it yet, as it is still alive, so lets assume my Spixi are well fed (not 100% sure though)


----------



## Jackson (Jan 30, 2009)

Get rid of it unless you want dead snails.
They're only good if you want to kill off other snails. It will kill your other snail even if there is other food to eat. 

If you have and outbreak of spixis which I doubt will happen you can just sell them. Spixis aren't going to take over your tank and if you don't try to get them producing large numbers it most likely won't happen on it's own. I've tried it just doesn't work you might get a few babies here and there but not many will show up.
The only way I get so many is by going through the process of removing and relocating the eggs and babies. 
If you don't want the babies just remove the eggs and dispose of them.

Ram horns can and will blow out if fed well and kept in warm water. 

MTS can't be stopped unless you add some earth eaters they harass them to death. I can't keep MTS alive in my Geo tank all I see are empty shells. 

If you don't want to worry about baby snails get some apple snails and if they do lay eggs you'll know where to find them just dispose of them and that's that.


----------



## zfarsh (Apr 7, 2011)

Hi Jackob,

Thanks. I may have to give it back to where i think it came from.

About the Ramshorns. I just separated them in their own tank (hospital). I guess if i want to stop their growth, just add some spixi to the tank for a while, right?


----------



## getochkn (Jul 10, 2011)

if it's a baby assassin, it won't do much damage right now. It will either eat bits of fish food or smaller baby snails. A newborn tiger cub won't go after a gazelle, but when it's full grown and a few years old, watch out mr gazelle. lol. 

The problem with assassins and their eggs is they can stay dormant for a long time. I've had babies start to pop up in a tank after like 6 months with no signs of them or removed all the visible adults months before. They can stay in the substrate for months and you'll never see them. I even had some live in a bag of dry substrate that I removed from a tank, put in a sealed bag, used 4 months later and out comes ramshorns and assassins in the tank like 10 minutes after flooding it.


----------



## Jackson (Jan 30, 2009)

IME they eat them if their not fed well. So starve them and it might do the trick though I've had them eaten by well fed spixis too.
I just thinks it's because the ram horn is vulnerable and the spixis take advantage if the fact that they are. 
They will for sure eat the eggs.


----------



## zfarsh (Apr 7, 2011)

@ getochkn: 
wow, i dont know if i should be amazed, or frightened!!!! I cant believe they were kept for 4 months dry, and still alive?? Holy Molly!!! In my case, it must have been an egg that was missed by my spixis!!! Man, i should be more stringent and always do the PP drip on new plants, i wouldnt have minded any other type of snails actual . Eventhough Assasin are beatifull...

@ Jackson:
Ok thanks. Right now i want to grow the number of Ramshorn a bit to put in all my tanks which also have spixis in them, even maybe my 75 gallon tank. As there are spixis, i guess i wont have to worry about their numbers growing, i hope.... Well, i say i hope, because i have a enough baby spixis in my 10g shrimp tank, with 4 adults, enough that i can put in my other tanks, even with my submerged roots only plants in glass vases. So maybe in my 75 g tank, the ramshorn enemy wont be Spixi, but my corydoras, as they sniff out the whole tank, so not much fish food left for the ramshorn, except alga and fish poop.


----------



## Jackson (Jan 30, 2009)

4 adults is why you see babies. 
I can see a clutch of eggs come back 10 minutes later and their gone. 
I now have them all in a 65 gallon and I still can't get babies unless I remove them. Last time I counted there was 150 adults and I recently move a lot out of my 30 gallon to join the rest and leave my crayfish on their own.


----------



## GAT (Oct 8, 2011)

sorry to hijack this thread but I've got few questions

how fast assassins reproduce? 

is one assasin snail enough? I don't want to replace my pond snail with assassin snails. Do they target MTS too?


----------

