Assassins

[szidlon]

All I know is I dropped 5 in a 10 gal that had pond snails in it & now it doesnt, not that I've seen the assassins either

I put the first ones I got (last August or so) into a tank overloaded with ramshorns, pond and mts's. They first cleaned out the pond and ramshorns, I'm guessing they were easier prey without the trap door so got picked off first. Now they're slowly taking on the mts's. It does take a while and if you're completely over run with mts's you still need do some trapping on your own to help out. You need to consider they can only eat so much, I think it's one snail every few days, so it's a slow process. I've found that once you get a few baby assassins in the tank, they help control the upcoming generations of mts's.

I have a lot of Assassins in my tanks now and I'm starting to see a decrease in visible mts's and more empty shells on the bottom. Besides, the assassins are nicer to look at in IMHO. I have a 10 gallon that I have a bunch of assassin babies in and once they reach a decent size I move them to other tanks. They reproduce so slowly that I have a tendency to hoard all the babies for myself.

[eklikewhoa]

I flicked the lights on to show Tim yesterday what an impact these guys have done.....


I will be looking for a pack of sidthimunki's today.

[J-WS6]

Maybe the cone shaped shell makes it easier for the MTS to retract further inside. Thus, the assassins spending more time trying to get to them?

These guys are cool to look at too.

[eklikewhoa]

Maybe they have a harder time getting to the MTS?

All I have noticed is that now instead of being in the substrate the MTS is up and about.

[spyke1969]

All I know is I dropped 5 in a 10 gal that had pond snails in it & now it doesnt, not that I've seen the assassins either

[J-WS6]

NICE!

[eklikewhoa]

Finally saw one do it's thang.... not very effective since this one has been trying to eat the MTS all day now and probably 1000 others have surfaced in it's place