# Assassins gettin it on



## Bob-O (Jan 28, 2012)

After a heater exploded I had to cycle my 90 gallon tank for a while. I pulled everything living thing out except the MTS, pond snails and plants. While it cycled the snail population exploded. I have more snails than I want now but I'm not concerned since I introduced 6 young assassin snails, and reintroduced the 4 adults that conceived them. It's going to be a while til the "pest" snails are under control, and that's fine by me. The assassins are chomping them left and right. So I guess my question is, does the availability of food cause them to breed more often? Cause the adults are mating like every other day. I witnessed one snail finish the deed, then crawl half way across the tank and mate with another female who was eating at the time. I've got dozens of young assassins still in my 55 and the adults didn't have nearly as many prey items in there. Am I looking at a ton of babies? The 90 is starting to get peppered with eggs. I'm also fine with that. I have friends that could use some. I'm willing to trade, and if nothing else the LFS will give me store credit.


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## Harley Quinn (Jan 6, 2012)

I have certainly noticed that with my pest snails that breeding is related to food availability. My pond snail reproduction rate decreased significantly when I added zebra nerites to a tank that had an abundance of algae. The zebras keep it sparkling clean, and the pond snails are present but behave themselves.


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## holly12 (Apr 21, 2011)

I'd say yes, it has to do with food availability. Much like other animals, I think if food is abundant, they figure "great place to have babies!" and away they go, lol.

I had 4 Adults and was told they breed incredibly slowly......not so much! I've got a ton of juvies in the tank now and still more eggs yet to be hatched! I have noticed, however, that since my pest snail population has been dwindling, there are less eggs than when they were getting fed pest snails a couple times a week. (As opposed to now, very few snails once a week.) They will eat brine shrimp and blood worms left over from feeding time as well. They are opportunistic feeders.


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## Summer (Oct 3, 2011)

congrats, very cool!


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