Many tiny snails - any concerns?

[Kathryn Lawson]

Hey everyone, it's me again! This time I've discovered 50+ itty bitty nocturnal snails (I think, anyway, they look and move like snails and have two little antennae) on my tank's glass walls. Is this anything I should be concerned about, or can I leave them be? I tried to get some reasonable clear pictures of them with my forefinger and a standard squeeze pipette tip for scale. I do have lightning dove snails which are known to reproduce in the aquarium (which I'm hoping for, honestly), but I haven't seen any eggs that they supposedly lay on the glass, and my snails have been active during the day, whereas I've never seen these tiny ones before tonight (I try to check in on my tank at night after the lights go out but maybe I've missed them in the past? I'm certain I've never seen them during the day). Given there's so many of them all at once (they are tiny, but I do only have a 10 gallon tank(, I'm wondering if there's anything I should be concerned about. Thanks in advance!

 

The two snails in the photos are the biggest I saw. Please ignore the messy desk in the background! Also, I have no idea why these photos keep posting upside down...

Edited January 3, 2023 by Kathryn Lawson

[AlanM]

They may be little collonista snails. If their shells are round they probably are. Harmless if so.

[Kathryn Lawson]

Their shells seem to come to a bit more of a blunt point than the collonista snail pictures I found on Google. But maybe a different/closely related species? I'm pretty confident they're not Pyramidellid snails, at least - definitely not pointy enough, and not grouped near/associated with my lightning dove snails.

[DaJMasta]

My guess would be the lightning doves, but I haven't seen their babies - I agree the collonistas tend to look rounder rather than the point on the back end these have.  You could try some magnification to get a better look, but it may just be hard to tell until they start getting coloration.

A lot of snails can't readily reproduce in a tank, and parasitic ones would likely be living close to their host, so I doubt they will become a problem, at least.

Edited January 7, 2023 by DaJMasta

[Origami]

I don't think they're Collonista, but something else. What speices of snails do you have in your tank now? Did you bring in anything new in the last month or so (like live rock)? Do you have pictures of any eggs that may have been laid on your glass in recent weeks? Sometimes the egg-laying pattern can offer a clue. The shape of at least one of the snails in your pictures reminds me of a nassarius (which I've seen breed in tanks). 

[Kathryn Lawson]

Honestly, I hope they're lightning doves - that would be pretty awesome! They're supposed to reproduce in the aquarium, though apparently much more slowly than regular dove snails. I haven't seen any eggs, though. I think the tiny snails go down into my sand bed during the day, which the lightning doves have not done at all - they're visible 24/7, mainly on the tank glass and rocks. So as cool as it would be for them to be lightning doves, I'm kinda doubting they are. I don't have any nassarius snails - just the lightning doves, some stomatellas, and formerly two ceriths (shells are empty now). The shells on these tiny guys looks more defined than the shells of stomatellas, so I don't think it's them.

[Origami]

Our tanks can be amazing to explore. If you have a jeweler's loupe or similar strong magnifier (Harbor Freight sells both a loupe set and a clip-on magnifier), it can be used to explore things on the glass and the leading edge of the sandbed. I remember doing that years ago and being fascinated by all the life on and under the sandbed.

[Kathryn Lawson]

Good idea, I'll have to find mine - I used it a lot when I started out in freshwater, but I think I misplaced it when moving here... Then again, I might just get another, given the low prices of the ones you linked!