MTS, What Loach Eats It?

[Raul-7]

I would like to know what loaches eat MTS - especially if Khulis or Dojo loaches do? Any other would be welcome.

[Jim Powers]

I have not heard of kuhlis or dojos eating snail before, but maybe someone else can correct me.
The botinae species of loaches : Clown loaches, the botia species (striata, dario, histrionica, rostrata, kuboatai) all are good snail eaters. However, MTS are much harder for them to eat so they will not get all of them and the population will continue to rise.
If you want to get rid of MTS, you can put some kind of algae wafer into the tank, wait for it to get covered with snails and remove them by hand. Its time consuming and the best you can hope for is to control the population.

[mikev]

Hi Raul-7,

Hopefully you are aware that kuhlis and dojos have different requirements and you tank is suitable for at most one species.

Per your question:

Kuhlis: no chance.

Dojos: They do, but apparently not as efficiently as the botinae.
(In fact I was eyeing some pretty dojos today thinking about dumping a few into hillstream tanks.,,,nay)

Jim, what is the situation with large schisturas and nemacheilus? Any hope there? I've been thinking about the fish you have ID'd for Frank, are they capable of doing some cleaning work? My schisturas are useless.

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APPEND.

Incidentally, Wikipedia has an article on dojos and refers to loaches.com just under the following text:

Because of their appetite for snails, these loaches can help alleviate snail infestations in tropical fish tanks, though many have reported that while weather loaches do eat snails, they do not eat them at a fast enough rate to deal with an infestation.

[Graeme Robson]

You cant beat the old 'lure' them trick. Thats the most effective method.

[Mad Duff]

My Clowns will eat as many MTS or tadpole snails as I can add to the tank the love both.

My Rostrata, Dario and Kubotai will scoff all the tadpole snails first and then move onto the MTS but they don’t eat all of them, there are never any tadpole snails in their tank apart from the ones I put in but there are always MTS in there.

My Sidthimunki will eat the tadpole snails and the smaller MTS but they soon lose interest in the MTS after eating all the tadpole snails.

My Dojo doesn’t seem to bother eating any although he will race backward and forward along the front of his tank flicking an MTS around, he plays with them for hours .

[Jim Powers]

mikev, I don't think that the schisturas and nemacheilus are snail eaters.

[Emma Turner]

My Schistura balteata seem to eat some of the snail population in my River Tank, although I can't vouch for other Schistura/Nemacheilus species. Not sure whether they would tackle MTS though.

Emma

[helen nightingale]

Jim suggested putting in an algae wafer in to lure the snails. i find some sort of meaty food put in the tank late at night does a good job - then you just scoop any snails out. i wish my nuisance snails had cheaper tastes!

[shari2]

a piece of garlic soaked cucumber (with skin on) has attracted HORDES of mts in the tank with my recuperating royal pleco. If I wanted to get rid of them I could get close to 60-70 just by pulling the cuc. They started in the center with the seeds and have now excavated nearly to the center of a 3" long piece. meanwhile the royal is scraping off the outside. Soon there will be NO cuc.

I'm thinking I'll harvest a bunch for the clowns in the 55. They seem to have decimated what was a quite thriving community of mts. never see them in that tank anymore...

[shari2]

Note to self:
Next time I pull a mts loaded veggie have a net at the ready for the jumpers! As I was lifting it bunches just dropped to the substrate. Still got MANY for the clowns, but...

and WHOA! what a clickfest when the snails hit the floor of their tank!. They seem to go for the snails that have heads that will fit in their mouths. The bigger the clown, the bigger the snail they went for.

Dropped a handful right in front of the tube the big guy sits in. Didn't come out (cause he could see me...) but when I blinked he'd shovelled a pile of gravel and snails into the front of the tube and was masticating away on a big snail. Looked like a kid with a lollypop. The omega loach had to content himself with chasing around a seed that had fallen in cause the other guys wouldn't let him play after the first few seconds. ;-(

[sophie]

either the dojos or the goldfish eat MTS to the point that there are only three, giant ones in the coldwater tank.

either the kuhlis or the yoyos eat smallish mts, but only if they're really hungry. a couple of weeks of me being away usually reduces the snail population to near invisible levels.