Re: The use of shell fish for green algae control

To: Aquatic-Plants at actwin_com (Aquatic-Plants)
Subject: Re: The use of shell fish for green algae control
From: "David W. Webb" <dwebb at ti_com>
Date: Wed, 24 Jul 1996 15:24:43 -0500
Conversation-Id: <BMSMTP83823959425a0206807 at dsks52_itg.ti.com>

>From: Stephen.Pushak at saudan_HAC.COM
>
>Has anyone used freshwater clams or mussels in aquariums? These might
>be good to help control green water. Are they difficult to keep? How
>do you feed them?

From what I understand, shellfish prefer hard water, but if that's what you've got, they might help.  

One problem with FW mussels is that their larvae are parasitic on fish.  I suspect that one mussel could really cause problems in the confined environment of an aquarium.  I understand that clams don't have this problem.

I'm currently under the assumption that a mollusk death in the tank (of mass x) is going to be basically the same as any other mollusk death in the tank (of the same mass).  I've had pretty large apple snails die without fouling my water (heavily planted tank), so if you don't have a lot of them, coupled with a mass die-off, I'd think they'd be relatively safe (as long as they didn't burrow way into the gravel before dying.

David W. Webb           Enterprise Computing
Texas Instruments Inc.  Dallas, TX USA
(214) 575-3443 (voice)  MSGID:       DAWB
(214) 575-4853 (fax)    Internet:    dwebb at ti_com
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