Pipe Dream: Plants and an Apple Snail?

"Susan" wrote in message
news:QmGud.245439$R05.30745@attbi_s53...

"Limnophile" wrote in message
...

snip

Seriously though, I've noticed that people who can't seem to grow java
fern
either have high hardness/pH or not enough potassium in the tank. Have
you
tried adjusting pH or using fertilizer with potash?

Keith J.
aka Limnophile


Interesting, since Java Fern is one of the few plants that are
consistently
recommended for the hardness and high pH of Rift Lake Cichlid tanks.
*confused*

Susan


I also have no luck with Java Ferns in my hard high-pH water.
Fortunately they also take a long time to die, so I still have one which
is over a year old, and still spreading, but it looks awful.
--
www.NetMax.tk

Thusly "Susan" Spake Unto All:

Seriously though, I've noticed that people who can't seem to grow java
fern
either have high hardness/pH or not enough potassium in the tank. Have you
tried adjusting pH or using fertilizer with potash?

Interesting, since Java Fern is one of the few plants that are consistently
recommended for the hardness and high pH of Rift Lake Cichlid tanks.
*confused*

I second the observation, though. I have java moss in two of my three
aquaria - it does best in the very soft (KH 0) and very acidic (pH
5.8) aquarium, which it has basically taken over; grows fairly slowly
in the intermediate aquarium (KH4, pH 7-7.5); and doesn't survive at
all in my borderline brackish, pH 8.3, exceedingly hard (liquid
limestone) aquarium.

I've also seen it recommended for hard, even brackish, tanks, but it
doesn't seem to cope with that kind of environment, and seems to do
best in soft & acidic water. IME.

Thusly John Thomas Spake Unto All:

Thanks... this is definitely Pomacea bridgesii... and it's also a living
lawnmower.

Sorry, I doubt, very strongly, you've got bridgesii if it eats living
plants. Very, very, strongly indeed.

Mean_Chlorine wrote:

Thanks... this is definitely Pomacea bridgesii... and it's also a
living lawnmower.

Sorry, I doubt, very strongly, you've got bridgesii if it eats living
plants. Very, very, strongly indeed.

Yeah, I second that. To determine what kinds I had, I spent at least
several hours doing minute comparisons of my snails to the rotating 3D
images at applesnail.net. They really are hard to tell apart, and the
stores that sell them rarely know the difference.


--
Eric Schreiber
www.ericschreiber.com

"Mean_Chlorine" wrote
I second the observation, though. I have java moss in two of my three
aquaria - it does best in the very soft (KH 0) and very acidic (pH
5.8) aquarium, which it has basically taken over; grows fairly slowly
in the intermediate aquarium (KH4, pH 7-7.5); and doesn't survive at
all in my borderline brackish, pH 8.3, exceedingly hard (liquid
limestone) aquarium.

I've also seen it recommended for hard, even brackish, tanks, but it
doesn't seem to cope with that kind of environment, and seems to do
best in soft & acidic water. IME.

With pH over 8.0 and/or very high hardness, the amount of CO2 in the water
is very low, which is obviously bad for plants. Java fern is tough, but if
you subject it to "CO2 starvation" (is that the right term?) even Java fern
will die too.

Limnophile

Mean_Chlorine wrote:
Thusly John Thomas Spake Unto All:


Thanks... this is definitely Pomacea bridgesii... and it's also a living
lawnmower.


Sorry, I doubt, very strongly, you've got bridgesii if it eats living
plants. Very, very, strongly indeed.


No reason to be sorry, its not like anyone died here, but I'm starting
to wonder if it really is canaliculata myself.

Aside from being a lawnmower-
1) It has yellow spots on the siphon, but not as many on the mouth as
some of the shots of Pomacea bridgesii I've seen on the web.

However-
1) I've never seen it devouring plants. It's currently in an all plastic
tank. (Which is why I posed my original question) I've only oberved it
hogging all the fish food. It's more like a composter than a lawnmower.
2) It recently laid eggs, which looked like the bridgesii moreso than
the canaliculata egg masses. (At least by the pictures on applesnail.net)

This sort of thing is what makes keeping fish interesting for me. The
surprising part is that so far, the inverts (snails and shrimp) have
been a lot more interesting than the fish. :-) After 3 months, none of
the roughly 4 dozen fish I've purchased have died, gotten sick, or made
babies. OTOH, I've had shrimp get sick, croak, make babies, watched
snails kill each other and lay eggs. The snails are without question the
most aggressive things in the tank.

"John Thomas" wrote in message
...
Mean_Chlorine wrote:
Thusly John Thomas Spake Unto All:


Thanks... this is definitely Pomacea bridgesii... and it's also a
living lawnmower.


Sorry, I doubt, very strongly, you've got bridgesii if it eats living
plants. Very, very, strongly indeed.


No reason to be sorry, its not like anyone died here, but I'm starting
to wonder if it really is canaliculata myself.

Aside from being a lawnmower-
1) It has yellow spots on the siphon, but not as many on the mouth as
some of the shots of Pomacea bridgesii I've seen on the web.

However-
1) I've never seen it devouring plants. It's currently in an all
plastic tank. (Which is why I posed my original question) I've only
oberved it hogging all the fish food. It's more like a composter than a
lawnmower.
2) It recently laid eggs, which looked like the bridgesii moreso than
the canaliculata egg masses. (At least by the pictures on
applesnail.net)

This sort of thing is what makes keeping fish interesting for me. The
surprising part is that so far, the inverts (snails and shrimp) have
been a lot more interesting than the fish. :-) After 3 months, none of
the roughly 4 dozen fish I've purchased have died, gotten sick, or made
babies. OTOH, I've had shrimp get sick, croak, make babies, watched
snails kill each other and lay eggs. The snails are without question
the most aggressive things in the tank.


I used to have a customer who would come in to buy the occasional live
plant as a treat for her snail (which was the size of her fist). The
tropical fish had long died, but the single remaining snail was a great
source of entertainment with all its antics. The customer had no
interest in adding more fish or anything else. The snail had its routine
and they didn't want to mess with that. Its usual diet was a leaf of
Romaine lettuce (yes, an entire leaf). There can be a lot of
entertainment in shrimps, snails, frogs and plants.
--
www.NetMax.tk

John Thomas wrote:

1) I've never seen it devouring plants. It's currently in an all
plastic tank.

Bear in mind that its behavior with plastic plants has nothing to do
with how it will treat live plants. While snails respond well to
chemical signals (mine always seemed to know when, and where, I'd
dropped their food) they probably lack the brain power required to
equate a plastic ornament with a live plant.

I think your plan to buy some cheap plants is the best approach. Try to
get very healthy plants, though, as most snails will eat dying leaves
and such.

I've only oberved it hogging all the fish food. It's more like
a composter thana lawnmower.

That sounds like a bridgesii.

This sort of thing is what makes keeping fish interesting for me. The
surprising part is that so far, the inverts (snails and shrimp) have
been a lot more interesting than the fish.

My bettas are the most interesting critters I've got, though the tank
full of bluegills I very stupidly set up may beat them - very
personable and entertaining fish!

But yeah, I agree that the inverts are very cool. Next time I hit a pet
store I plan on restocking my ghost shrimp population. I gave up on the
apple snails because mine were breeding out of control and tank
maintenance was becoming a nightmare. But they were pretty groovy. I
even had some hydra at one point, which I found really interesting.


--
Eric Schreiber
www.ericschreiber.com

"Eric Schreiber" eric at ericschreiber dot com wrote in message
...
John Thomas wrote:

1) I've never seen it devouring plants. It's currently in an all
plastic tank.

Bear in mind that its behavior with plastic plants has nothing to do
with how it will treat live plants. While snails respond well to
chemical signals (mine always seemed to know when, and where, I'd
dropped their food) they probably lack the brain power required to
equate a plastic ornament with a live plant.

I think your plan to buy some cheap plants is the best approach. Try to
get very healthy plants, though, as most snails will eat dying leaves
and such.

I've only oberved it hogging all the fish food. It's more like
a composter thana lawnmower.

That sounds like a bridgesii.

This sort of thing is what makes keeping fish interesting for me. The
surprising part is that so far, the inverts (snails and shrimp) have
been a lot more interesting than the fish.

My bettas are the most interesting critters I've got, though the tank
full of bluegills I very stupidly set up may beat them - very
personable and entertaining fish!

But yeah, I agree that the inverts are very cool. Next time I hit a pet
store I plan on restocking my ghost shrimp population. I gave up on the
apple snails because mine were breeding out of control and tank
maintenance was becoming a nightmare. But they were pretty groovy. I
even had some hydra at one point, which I found really interesting.

I had some worms which were pretty cool. I think they were tubifex worms
and they had a spot in the substrate where they would poke their 'heads'
out. At some point I think some Bronze corys went into that tank, so at
around the same time, the worms disappeared and the corys spawned. Your
Bluegills might be quite interesting.
--
www.NetMax.tk


--
Eric Schreiber
www.ericschreiber.com

On Fri, 10 Dec 2004 21:21:42 -0600, "Eric Schreiber" eric at
ericschreiber dot com wrote:

Limnophile wrote:

Java fern and Anubias are both pretty tough, and might stand a
chance. It also depends on which exact species of snail, some are
more prone to eat live plants than others.

The one downside to those kinds of plants is their slow growth - if a
snail is only nibbling on them a small amount, it might still out-pace
the growth rate of the plant. Of course, I'm one of those unhappy folks
who has trouble keeping Java Fern alive - for all I know it isn't slow
growing at all.


Quoting :
[...]
safe, as are Malaysian trumpet snails. --Eric Schreiber"

Hehe, that may be the closest I ever come to fame

Slow growth is a two edged sword, less prunning is good. I have
nothing but low light plants and am very happy to not be in the tank,
very often, trimming.