Part 7: Expecting More (Eggs)



Part 7: Expecting More (Eggs)

         And so it began. I woke up at 5:30am to Escargo beginning her first batch of eggs.



You can see an egg as it travels out from under her shell to be placed on the eggs sac.

          Here Escargo is about half of her maximum size. They begin breeding when they are slightly larger than a quarter. At this time Escargo was larger than a quarter, but smaller than a 50 cent piece. She continued laying eggs all her life.  She would lay furiously 4 to 5 egg batches in one week, then mellow out with nothing for two weeks or more.  This batch was her first of 4 batches in about 5 days. She laid a fifth batch about a week after the fourth. All in all it took her nearly 4 hours from beginning to end.  Poor thing was exhausted afterwards, but she still managed to cruise and get some breakfast after she was done.
          Now lets talk about the mechanics of snail egg laying. First and foremost, as previously stated and obviously shown in the pictures above, the snail MUST LEAVE the water to lay eggs. As you can see in above pictures, I kept the water level about 2 inches down from the top of the tank for this very reason. I would like to also add that I had a secure lid on the tank at all times to keep them from climbing up and falling out. I merely lifted it to take the picture. If you don't keep the water level down then the snails simply climb up under the hood. Believe me, they will definitely find somewhere to lay their eggs.
            If you don't want baby snails then you can simply push the egg sac into the water. The eggs need a moist environment, but they will drown in water. They need air. There can be as few as 30 or as many as 200+ in one egg batch, depending on the size of the batch. The mother snail climbs out of the water and searches for the perfect spot. Once she finds it she twists herself to the left, tucks her head under her shell and begins producing a very sticky goo that she uses to glue the eggs to her selected spot and to glue each of the eggs together. As with males, the female reproductive parts are always on the snails right.
             When the snail begins laying her eggs she goes into a sort of trance. Unless you actually touch her or violently shake the tank, its pretty hard to disturb them. Each egg is not uniformly the same size. Some are larger than others and some smaller. It can take 5 hours or more for a snail to finish laying one batch of eggs. 

             Here is a video where you can see Escargo place 3 of her eggs onto the batch.






              So after Escargo finally finished with her batch, she dropped into the water and this is what the egg batch looked like.




              At first the eggs are very soft and vulnerable. They are a milky white with a slight pinkish hue. Eventually they harden. Since the eggs are laid in a moist environment this could take up to several days for the whole egg sac to completely harden. (Some of the egg sacs that are laid very close to the water, took nearly a week.)
             If they are laid in a slightly dryer area then they can be hardened in a matter of hours. As they harden the eggs darken and completely turn pink. Here is a picture of the same egg sac on day 7.





            As you can see it is more pink and the eggs are slightly see through. After the egg sac hardens you can remove it from the glass by gently sliding it back and forth until it releases. (I found this a necessity since the egg sacs for whatever reason began falling into the water.) Once you remove them you can keep them on a homemade hatchery. I first attempted to use a floating hatchery with some styrofoam, pop-sickle sticks, and plastic netting I bought in the craft section at Walmart. I just let the little raft float on top of the water. I also added on two other egg batches that she laid, eventually adding a fourth. Here are some pictures.


You can see that the second batch is fresh. Still hasn't even fully hardened, but it wasn't attached very well and I knew it was going to fall in the water. Here is the little raft.

I added paper towels both underneath and surrounding them because  I was worried that the eggs were getting too dry from being directly underneath the light. I dampened the towels throughout the day, making sure that they weren't actually touching the egg sacs.


                Now I learned several things from my little egg raft experience. Firstly is that letting them float on the surface simply doesn't keep them warm enough. The warmer they are the faster they hatch. (Not too warm mind. Don't want to cook the little guys.) These guys were so cold it took more than a month for her first egg sac to hatch. About 34 days. I also learned how important it was to keep the temperature stable. Not even half of her first egg batch hatched do to, I believe, the constant fluctuations from me trying to keep them in different places and temperatures. First for about a week I kept the light off, too afraid that they would cook. Then I used the paper towels and kept the light on, even at night, because I was worried about the temperature drop at night. I also let them get too dry at first.
             Eventually though, the eggs did hatch and I got my first baby mystery snails!


Here you can see a couple of tiny dots next to the egg sacs. Yup those are baby snails!

Here is a close up. See the little guy crawling out? Cute isn't he?


              At first it was only two or three at a time. They hatched over the course of about 4 days. 

Here you can see quite a few more of the little guys making a break for it.

Close up!


              The reason they hatched over such a long period of time was partly do to my not keeping them at a steady temperature and partly because I was too afraid to "help" them hatch. Eventually I got brave enough and tried it and ended up with nearly a hundred babies.  What I finally did was break open the sac so that all the little babies inside could get out at the same time. I was terrified to do this at first. I was so afraid I would crush the little guys. But as I later came to learn, when an egg sac is ready to hatch, it pretty much falls apart. Now for what I learned from the eggs being laid to the babies hatching.


Here is a really neat picture of some babies hatching out of an egg sac. Now I am not sure why they didn't all hatch at the same time in this egg sac. Perhaps most of the eggs weren't fertile? What ever the reason this happens on occasion. Only a few of the eggs hatch.


How to successfully hatch a Mystery Snail egg sac:

1. Wait until the eggs have hardened then carefully remove.

2. Place the eggs on a makeshift raft in a tupper ware container with a small amount of water on the bottom. Place eggs so that the water is just touching the bottoms of the egg sacs. (There will be a flat area where the sac was stuck to the glass. This is the bottom.)

3. Place the tupper ware container with the lid set gently on top (NOT SEALED), either under a warm light or on top of your computer, xbox, DVR, or atop a heating pad on low setting. Basically on an area that is constantly warm. I keep my egg sacs in a container on top of my fish tank lid, right over the light. They are kept warm from the bottom and I just keep the light on. (I grow algae in my tank for my Nerite Snails.) Make sure the lid to the container is sat kind of cock-eyed to allow air flow while still keeping the eggs moist.

4. Add a little bit of water morning and night to keep the eggs moist. Wait about two weeks (usually even less).

5. Observe the egg sacs. As they age they look grosser and grosser. They lighten in color to a sick looking greenish grey. The outer shell gets even lighter while the inside can be seen to be very dark underneath. Rule of thumb. If you open the top and what you see makes you want to gag, then the babies are ready to hatch!

6. Make sure you have a tank prepared. Ten gallon or smaller, preferably with some algae build up. Make sure it is cycled, has high ph, and a filter that won't suck up the little snails. (A sponge filter works great.)

7. Reach in and gently pick up the egg sac. It should just fall apart in your fingers. The center will be hollow except for the mass of scores of little babies inside.

8. Put your fingers in the water and gently rub the sac into pieces between your finger and thumb. The babies will fall to the bottom along with the tiny pieces of egg sac that the babies will eat.
           
Or you could just leave the egg sacs be and let them hatch naturally. Depending on the temperature in the tank and their vicinity to the tank light, it will probably take a little longer. And you run the risk of the egg sac falling into the tank. I have even had another snail knock several off when searching for an area to lay her own eggs.

            And there you go! You have successfully hatched baby mystery snails! Here are some more pictures. These pictures are more recent, after I got the hang of hatching the little guys.



See? I just keep the container with the
lid ascew on top of my fish tank light.



I just don't ever turn the light off. See all that
beautiful condensation in there?


Here is a close up.



And here it is! My latest batch of egg sacs. I just
barely keep a layer of water in the bottom.
Just enough to keep it moist in there.



              This is my current set up. Every week or so I rinse out the container. As you will learn if you decide to hatch some snails, the egg sacs smell. The container starts to smell after a while, so a good rinsing is called for. Also I need to point out that not all egg sacs are fertile. Some are just empty eggs. Like a chicken that doesn't have a rooster around. She still lays eggs, they just won't hatch. After about 3 weeks tops if there is no change in color and the eggs remain really pink, with no cloudiness evident, I toss them.
               Here are a few older pictures that I wanted to use to show the difference between egg sacs that were just laid and ones that are ready to hatch.



See how yucky those two look? Yup they are just about ready. When they look like that you can pick them up and they just fall apart with the babies spilling out.


             In this next picture I hatched the smaller one (above) completely and left the larger of the two sacs in pieces to illustrate.






                 All those little dots are baby snails! And with that we move on to the next section and the best part....

BABIES!!!

UPDATE!!!

Here is a recent video showing just how to hatch those little babies out of their egg sacs! Take a look.







Next Page: Baby Snails!


10 comments:

  1. Wow I love this information. Thanks you. Was wondering do snails mate very often. I've only seen my snails get stuck once for about a half hour. Do they need to mate a lot in order for the female snail to lay fertilized eggs.

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    1. It depends on the snails. I have noted in my blog that the females go through times where the males seem to be crazily attracted to them. Like they are giving off pheromones or something I am sure. As far as I know they only need to mate once to have fertilized eggs, but also keep in mind that even with constant mating there are going to be unfertilized egg sacs. About 1 in 5 are infertile as far as I have found. Thanks for the compliments and I am glad to be of help! :)

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    2. I have 4 clutches in one week. The female is still getting to the top of the tank, so I bet I will wake up tomorrow and see another clutch, or 2. The clutches I have are in a container, with damp paper toweling in the bottom, floating around the tank. This is my first time with Apple Snails. :)

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    3. Wonderful! I am sure your going to really enjoy these guys! They are charming to watch. I wish you luck with your clutches! Don't hesitate to ask any questions I will be happy to help.

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  2. Thank you so much, this is very helpful :)

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    Replies
    1. Your very welcome! I am glad your finding this information useful! :)

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  3. How do I get the snails to stop laying clutches? I have read all over the place about putting glass on the top of the tank and filling the water so that there isn't space between the topper and the water. BUT.. then they go ahead and say, they will lay eggs against the glass. Which is it? lol I have enough clutches for now, I think. Have to actually wait to see if thy are fertile or not. But I don't need clutch after clutch after clutch being made here. Is a glass cover with the water filled up to it the answer to stop them from laying more? Thanks :)

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    Replies
    1. Well you could try the glass thing, but I wouldn't recommend it. These snails need air! And believe it or not, but so does the rest of your tank. Most likel the little lady would end up just laying them under water or finding SOMEWHERE to lay a clutch. You can't prevent them in any way from laying eggs. Its just going to keep happening. You can just keep male snails and give away your female if you don't want eggs in your tank. Or you can just toss out the unwanted egg sacs. Either way your going to have to accept the fact that this is part of keeping these animals. They don't have an off switch, they just follow natures laws and do what their bodies tell them to do. Eat, mate, lay eggs, eat, mate, lay eggs. This is pretty much their entire purpose for life. Its all they do. Sorry, but when it comes to egg sacs there isn't anything you can do. I would just toss out the ones you don't want and be done with it. :-) Any more questions you have please ask! hopefully I will actually have a solution for you next time. :-)

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  4. I found 2 egg sacs about 4-5 weeks ago. One hatched and I now have a bunch of golden babies and the other is still just a pink egg sac. I shown a flashlight under it and I think I saw a small dark object in 2 of the eggs. Is it an infertile clutch? Also, I am interested in breeding to get different color snails. I have a confirmed female dark tannish/brown female, a confirmed dark brown male, a confirmed dull blue male, an unknown sex blue, and 2 unknown sex goldens. I also just orders 2 unknown sex dark purples. How do you breed ivory, jade, light purple, pink, etcetera? Please either message me on facebook(Lindsey Beth wills), text me at (304)-616-2724, or if you can't do either, comment on here I guess. Thank you so much for all the info!

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  5. Wow. Thank you for creating this blog. I've searched and searched for mystery snail information but could only find the same basic care stuff. This is exactly what I've needed!

    Helpful tip:
    One of my mystery snails kept trying to lay eggs while hanging upside down from the underside of my glass hinged top and falling back into the water. I'm talking over and over. Lol. I heard a loud *plop* every hour all night. Apparently that snail isn't the smartest because it just kept doing it. I was worried that it'd stress itself out and die. So I came up with an idea that has worked great! I bought 2 silicone suction cup soap dishes in the bath accessory aisle at Walmart for $3 each. The kind that doesn't have big holes so there's plenty of dry flat surface for egg laying. I put one above the water on each side of my 20 gallon long tank. All the snails now use them and I don't have to worry about them getting knocked into the water etc.

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