Nassarius snails eating clam????

[Poseidon]

I saw this in my tank this morning .... The clam was all closed up and covered in slime and ALL 10 of my nassarius snails were either on it or under it.

What do you guys think their up to??

 

[Duke]

I saw this in my tank this morning .... The clam was all closed up and covered in slime and ALL 10 of my nassarius snails were either on it or under it.

What do you guys think their up to??

they can sense death really well, that clam was already dying, they just cleaned it up... or they were predatory welks and not the snails you thought they were.

 

[Poseidon]

Strange, clam seemed perfectly fine last night

 

[Salty Cracker]

Look up cantharid whelk.  They look similar, and definitely predatory.

 

[Poseidon]

thanks for the info guys, never heard of a whelk before, but i followed a couple links and did some comparing, im pretty sure what i have is nassarius and not whelks.

...Whelks don't travel too quickly, in my experience. By comparison, Nassarius glide across the sand exceedingly fast, moving on a large foot that allows them to move forward effortlessly....

http://www.melevsreef.com/id/whats_a_whelk.html

mine defintly glide very quickly across the sand and

Whelks act like snails, and tend to be on the glass or rockwork. They will move across the sand when necessary, but never submerge themselves beneath the surface of the sand.

mine are buried all day except when food comes into the tank... is it possible the clam was doing something to attract them? like spawning??? maybe ? i dont know just throwing and idea out there...

of course, like duke said it could be dying and the nassarius are just eating it... but, it looked very healthy and was full mantle as of yesterday... ill have to check its condition later tonight i guess.

 

[Duke]

thanks for the info guys, never heard of a whelk before, but i followed a couple links and did some comparing, im pretty sure what i have is nassarius and not whelks.

...Whelks don't travel too quickly, in my experience. By comparison, Nassarius glide across the sand exceedingly fast, moving on a large foot that allows them to move forward effortlessly....

http://www.melevsreef.com/id/whats_a_whelk.html

mine defintly glide very quickly across the sand and

Whelks act like snails, and tend to be on the glass or rockwork. They will move across the sand when necessary, but never submerge themselves beneath the surface of the sand.

mine are buried all day except when food comes into the tank... is it possible the clam was doing something to attract them? like spawning??? maybe ? i dont know just throwing and idea out there...

of course, like duke said it could be dying and the nassarius are just eating it... but, it looked very healthy and was full mantle as of yesterday... ill have to check its condition later tonight i guess.

i'd say its done for.. pull the snails off and remove the clam.. theres no coming back from that..

 

[Poseidon]

i wont be home til late tonight, if its dead, they may as well eat it all... lol, dont mean to sound cruel but i guess its the circle of life

they havent touched the clam for 3 months now, so obviously something happened... its to bad , i liked that clam...

 

[phi delt reefer]

pretty sure (from melev's description) you have whelks.


their snouts look like they have tattoo pattern vs the plain snout of the narissus.

i would pull those snails out too.  Escargot those bad boys

 

[Poseidon]

pretty sure (from melev's description) you have whelks.


their snouts look like they have tattoo pattern vs the plain snout of the narissus.

i would pull those snails out too.  Escargot those bad boys

no i dont think so, they would've killed the clam the second the two were in the same tank... and i quoted some of melevs descriptions and im 95% sure mine are nassarus snails,

either way... not the end of the world for anybody, (except the clam)

 

[Poseidon]

i called my brother and told him to take the clam out and throw it out... its obviously dead, ( he said the snails are all over it again,)
and i really dont want a spike in the tank

 

[Duke]

i called my brother and told him to take the clam out and throw it out... its obviously dead, ( he said the snails are all over it again,)
and i really dont want a spike in the tank

ya theres no going back once those snails start eating.. i had the same happen to a clam i once had.. it was good to go and looked great for a few months.. then one day i saw one of those buggers eating the mantle.. the next day it was just like your photo.. i never added another clam just because of that actually.. this was a while ago and didnt really have the proper clam conditions in my tank tho now that i look back at it.

 

[Poseidon]

ya good call on the dying thing..
i never woulda guessed, seem happy as could be,

but in doing more reading im finding that if they dont get enough light they can die a slow death.... considering he was kinda shaded at 30" down..... shit anyways...  :?

 

[phi delt reefer]

clam killer...

 

[Salty Cracker]

I was told a long time ago that anything with that long peni...trunk could be a killer when it comes to snails.  Of course that could have been a generalization.  I think those teeeeny white snails can kill clams though. and every so often I find one on the glass or something, so I know they're in there.

 

[yveterinarian]

I saw this in my tank this morning .... The clam was all closed up and covered in slime and ALL 10 of my nassarius snails were either on it or under it.

What do you guys think their up to??

Hi Brandon: 

Sorry to hear about your clam.  Judging by your picture, you seem to have two different kinds of nassarius snails.  I had a problem with the darker ones with the black proboscus in that they always attacked my Garden eel.  At one time they ate a hole on the side of him before I noticed it.  I removed all of the dark proboscus ones and he recovered and is still thriving a year later.  He was not sick before hand and my all acted as nassarius snails should..niver thought of whelks but, like yours they didn't act like whelks. 

The white ones have never attacked anything in my tank so I am now very descriminating when I buy Nassarius.  As the article you read said the clam needed more light, he was most likely sick but watch those darker ones and any bottom dweller you may have. 

 

[Krazykarl]

Wow. This is interesting to me bc about three weeks ago my hammer looked terrible. All withered up and sliming. Upon further observation I noticed a shell attached to one of the heads. It was a massarrius snail, or so I thought until now, just hangin out on the skeleton of this hammer. I let it be thinking it was just passing by. Two days later it was dead. Then my purple and green game started looking weird. One head all curled up and there was this snail again. F that I said lol. I grabbed the little f'er and chucked him in my sump. Never knew about a whelk. After reading this I'm glad I removed him.