Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi!
I am the proud owner of a Pig Nosed puffer fish (TETRADON SUVATTI). He resides in a 29 gallon glass aquarium with a Penguin Bio Wheel Power Filter 200B. His water conditions are great. Nitrate 0, Nitrite 0, Ammonia 0, P.H. 7.0, and the temperatures kept at 78 degrees F. He has “regular (meaning of size, shape, and natural color)” gravel, a medium piece of driftwood, and two (2) large Amazon sword plants. He gets fed 4 times a week. Either live Red Claw Crabs or frozen Krill, and feeder fish as a rare treat.

My problem is, I have an infestation of very rapidly reproducing snails. I believe they hitched a ride on the live plants. I have tried many different things to get rid of them. Leaving zucchini in at night and removing it in the morning with many snails attached. I’ve tried manually killing them. But nothing even HELPS. And the puffer isn’t interested in eating them.

I was wondering if it would be safe to use “Had A Snail”, which is a copper treatment. I was concerned that it may harm “Mr. Puff Puff” because he is scale less. I know to remove the live plants and carbon from the filter. Are there any special dosing requirements with puffer fish? And if I cannot safely use this product, is there something else I may do to get rid of these eyesores?
Thank you for your time,
Mary & Mr. Puff Puff

Oh goodness! I hate snails.

Unfortunately, you are not supposed to use copper treatments with scaleless fish. You can try what I did: pick all the individual snails off your tank that you see and all the algae looking stuff on the side as those will become little annoying snails. It's very odd that your puffer won't eat them. My best friend's puffer loves them, well he was a figure 8. Once you get all the snails, get a big pan of water and boil it. Stick the snails in there and no more snails. I admit it took me like 25 minutes to round them all up and I did have to repeat the procedure whenever I saw a snail, but I was without snails after about 2 weeks if I remember correctly.

I read the information I could find on Had A Snail on liveaquaria.com and it doesn't say it's a copper treatment, but it does say only freshwater only and no inverts. It also says don't swallow it (of course you know this) so I wouldn't want to use that in my tank personally. Are you sure it's a copper product?
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Phishie

"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure."

Hey Fishie!
Thanks for the info. I guess manual removal is my only choice. BUt I love my Mr. Puff and woyuld never do anything to harm him. Someone told me to starve him untill he eats the snails ! I will NOT be doing that.

Here is the ingredients list for Had A Snail
ACTIVE INGREDIENTS : COPPER SULFATE PENTAHYDRATE 6.34%
METALLIC COPPER EQUIVALENT 1.60%
INERT INGREDIENTS 93.66%

Thanks again for your help. I promise I will not be drinking this stuff. ha!

~Mary

Unfortunately that's how it goes sometimes. I'm glad to know you'd do anything for your fishie though. You could try to leave him no other options, but do this no longer than 4-5 days.
You're welcome. That's what I'm here for.
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Phishie

"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure."