Help with snail identification

**Corydoras** · 02-12-2011, 10:13 PM

Ok, so I have "adopted" a snail from a friend after her aquarium exploded. Literally. She was lucky to save this little guy, everyone else in the tank perished. She's decided that she's giving up on fish-keeping, and she knows that I love all things odd and unusual (and more importantly, I always have spare tanks lying around because my hobby is herpetoculture).

She told me that he was sold under the name "gold mystery snail". I believe I read somewhere that that's just another name for an apple snail. This is my first-ever snail..I'm a bit lost, to be honest.

I was hoping to enlist the help of those who are more experienced than I in this area...which brings me to the forum. Can you help me identify this snail so that I may give it the proper care?

This picture is of him shortly after we got home. He's in his original tankwater right now, or at least what his owner was able to salvage from the destroyed tank. Don't worry about the size of the tank he's in, he's only in that 5gal for quarantine, and he's all by himself. I plan to set aside something bigger in case he needs it...unless he'll be ok in that size of a tank? I just don't know, again, I've never kept snails before.

**CassieLEO** · 02-12-2011, 10:16 PM

Its a gold myserty snail, with some algae growing on its shell. You can clean off the shell if you want, but I leave mine alone. You can set up the 5 gallon for him and add some plants and some driftwood for him to climb on. You can also add some cuttlefish bone to the tank for him to have calcium. You will need a filter and something to change the water with. (about 25% weekly) They are very cool animals, I have about 6 in my tank. They will eat algae tabs, and I feed mine NLS Algae wafers. They do eat veggie such as lettuce, zucchini and cucumbers.

**Corydoras** · 02-12-2011, 10:25 PM

Thanks for that info, CassieLEO! You're really helpful. So...are they related to apple snails at all? What's the species name for golden mystery snail? Just curious...I like to learn all I can about the pets I keep.

**CassieLEO** · 02-12-2011, 10:28 PM

Yep, they are the same thing...Theres lots of conflicting things about them, some say they are the same, some say they arent. I believe they are the same. Here, check out this site-
http://www.petfish.net/articles/Inve...es/mystery.php
Its definately a good thing to research your pets, then you can be sure they have a good, healthy and happy life.

Heres another good site-
http://www.applesnail.net/

**Corydoras** · 02-12-2011, 11:14 PM

Thanks so much! I will check out those sites. Normally I do research BEFORE I aquire a new animal...but this was an emergency situation.

Oh! one more thing....I've heard that snails are not supposed to have metal anywhere near them. Unfortunately, my friend didn't have anything else to gather the water from the damaged tank in....I mean, her tank just exploded, she probably wasn't thinking...but she took him over to me in a metal pot that she used to collect the tank water. I doubt he was in there longer than 30 minutes, and he seems ok so far...but could that have harmed him?