Does anyone have any olive nerite snails? I read that they are great algae eaters and that they don't reproduce in freshwater. I'd love to buy or trade for a few. Anyone ever try to breed them? Here's a forum post that I found about how to breed them:
Well I’ve been breeding Nerites for a while. It seems to be a lot of confusion to a lot of people. Lets start off slow to clear the water from messy breeding details.
Nerites are A sexually. Once eggs are laid they can be transfer to a fully saltwater tank non brackish water I well explain this later. How do you get your little snails to lay eggs? More they’ll eat the more they’ll will to lay eggs. 99.9 percent of the time they’ll lay eggs on your glass rocks or hard surface. I usually wait about maximum 72 hours before moving the egg. In case my Nertie might want to lay a few more. I’ve notice my best Nerita are laid on drift wood. I well explain this in a bit and the reason why. It doesn't matter what kind of water you breed them in whether it be fresh salt or brackish. Let me be a little bit more clear about this. What will matter is how you will hatch these eggs. Nerite eggs can take a long time to hatch from a few days to a few weeks. I had a few eggs that hatched a month later. As far as water temperature my hatching is room temp. As cold as a bowl of goldfish water.
Alright time to get down to the good stuff with directions.
1. Pick a item(s) with some good algae mounted to it. Place this item where your Nerite well be. FRESH SALT OR BRACKISH WATER. What temp isn’t important. What quality should be at the best possible. I personally like using drift wood. Driftwood has tons of algae for these baby to feed.
2. Wait a few days. Until you see a good amount of eggs on item/decor. These eggs look like little sesame seeds. WARNING DONT TRY TO REMOVE THESE EGGS BY SCRAPPING THEM. You'll pop the shell. Wait about 72 hours to get a nice size decor with eggs on them.
3. Set up a small tank. I’m using a 1 gallon tank to nurse the babies nitrites. A air bubble line that is set very low 1bubble ever 2 seconds. Also a marine/saltwater (freshwater salt wont work). Why salt and no brackish. The reason is once these Nertie are born at this stage they need all the calcium and mineral to develop a health strong shell. Which well increase the level of survival as juveniles. I had little luck with brackish water. My percentage increased about 80 percent when I’ve hatched Nerite in fully saltwater tank. I usually fill the saltwater level just enough to cover the decor/driftwood.(this is where youll place your decor cover with eggs)
4. Usually about every 3 days I well perform a 50 percent water change. Don’t want your snail to die from bad water. This is easy to do. Don’t be lazy takes less then 5 mins.
5. Once your eggs are hatching. Theyll hatch at a very slow rate. You’ll see that they're very small larvae. You can feed them algae that's on your décor or driftwood. If not you can head to your local aquarium or pet shop. And purchase some algae chips.
Chop these algae chips into small fine grains. And drop them in your tank. Feed them by eye. If you don’t see any food. Give them food.
6. Once you see a nice shine to the shell on your snail, its time to move them. This process can take weeks. I don’t recommend one or 2 days. They'll die on you. Purchase a small measuring device. The measurement I am using is ML. For my one gallon tank. I would treat about gallon of freshwater(for people out there that don’t know what Im talking about treating your water. Neutralizing water from harmful chemicals using(Tetra Aqua Clear (or any other brand).Simply ever morning take out 10ml of tank water. Replace 5Ml in the morning and 5ML at night. For a full month. This step is only for freshwater tanks. For brackish or salt. Just lower the level of salt until you reach your tanks ppm. For a safe entry.
Enjoy your new NERITES. Usually i breed about 100 a month and sell them to my local pet shop.
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