Snails from T&T

[kari]

Can anybody ID the "sea" snails from T&T market? The shell is similar to a Margarita yet the body is not. They sell for approx $5/lb. I've tried a few out in my fuge and they seem to just carry on like all the others with nothing out of the ordinary to mention. I'll try again to take a pic if needed.

Kari

[Quinn]

What water temperature do they keep them at there? You may be on to something.

[Samw]

They are probably from cold water.

http://www.canreef.com/phpBB2/viewto...ghlight=snails

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showth...ld+water+snail

[Quinn]

I guess if they last for even a few months, they're essentially as good as any other snail... I can't keep the damn things alive for longer than a few weeks it seems, other than turbos and what I believe are astreas.

[impreza]

keep us posted! On the RC link, they mentioned that margarita snails are cold-water snails...so, maybe those really are margarita snails?

[LostMind]

Well, I cant keep margarita snails alive for very long.But cerith, astrea, trochus, stomatella all seem to do fine in my tank.

[Delphinus]

Are Margarite (Marguerite? I never know how to spell this one) the snails with the black shells? If so I know there is a snail off the west coast in our own waters that is almost a perfect replica (as far the shell is concerned). I have no idea what they are, except that they're cold water and intertidal. The beaches near Ucluelet are literally just huge piles of these shells instead of pebbles or sand.

But for that matter I'm not so sure that margarite snails aren't intertidal, or that we aren't sold intertidal snails now and again as margarites. I know I once bought a batch of margarites that kept crawling out of the tank. I'd find them as far away from the tank as on the other side of the room. If they were lucky enough that I found them in time I'd plop them back into the tank but I suppose it's not surprising that eventually, one by one they didn't get so lucky. Anyhow I'm now not sure why I bring this up other than to share my "stupid snails" story .... stupid snails.

[EmilyB]

That's funny Tony.. I had those snails too. One day I had more on the outside of the tank than on the inside....

[Samw]

From this month's reef keeping magazine.

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-05/rs/index.htm

So there you have it. The ones for $5/lb are BC Tegula sp. snails (The clerk at T&T told me they are BC Snails) that look like Margarita (Margarites sp.) snails. Even true Margarita snails though are found in cooler waters. This explains why I have bought dozens of Margaritas but not 1 survived whereas my Astreas, Trochus, Ceriths are mostly all alive.


"I have counted over 120 annual growth rings on some specimens of Tegula funebralis, a temperate water species. This species is one of the three or four species of Trochoideans collected from cool water areas of Baja California and unethically sold to gullible, or informed, aquarists as a reef aquarium animal under the delightfully ambiguous name of "margarite or margarita snail. Tegula funebralis has a high thermal tolerance for an animal that lives in cold water areas (it ranges northward from Baja and is common in the British Columbian and Alaskan intertidal zones). They normally live a small fraction of one percent of their normal life span, or only a few months, in reef aquaria."

"This confusion is complicated by various distributors and dealers who just can't seem to grasp "The Phenomenon of a Name," and blissfully attach names seemingly at random to their livestock. A good example of this is in the common name, "Margarite snail." Well folks, I have been studying snails for a long time, and to me a "Margarite snail" is a snail in the genus Margarites. These are small snails, similar in many regards to the grazers we put into our tanks. They are even found in the tropics. However, when they are found in the tropics, they live several thousand feet down in water whose temperature is 39° F. or lower. In other words, there are no snails of the genus Margarites that are found in warm tropical waters."

[Beverly]

The margaritas I got from J&L last year are doing well in my tanks. They're real cruisers and can right themselves whereas turbos and astreas not so much.

Margaritas:
http://www.jlaquatics.com/cgi-bin/sh...alogno=rc-marg