Snail complaint

[Coasting]

No matter what they were on, they always managed to land at least an inch or 2 away from any surface on the sand bed and laid there upside down twirling their foot in circles not accomplishing a thing. Thats why I first bought the trochus because of their famous ability to right themselves. But I didn't think I would have to be flipping the stupid things over twice a day. The astreas just dont fall over.
All though... The trochus seemed to land in the sand with the tip of their shell directly down, where as the astreas seem to land on the side of the shell and have better luck where they land? (from what I've seen in my tank anyway) and are usually close enough to the glass or rock to just grab on.

Dont know what to say about Nerites, bought 3, only 1 survived the 20 min drive home from J&L, and I dont notice a path of squeaky clean glass after he passes like I do with the astreas. Haven't had to flip him. Have had to flip my Cowries once I think. The Nassarius snails obviously flip themselves, thankfully otherwise I wouldn't get away with tossing them to the other side of the tank when they harass my coral at feeding time.

[Enigma]

I've never had to flip a Mexican Turbo over, but I did kill three of the four I had with high mag levels.

I have mostly spiny Astrea, and I've needed to rescue a couple in the last few months. They are great cleaners. I have no experience with the regular Astrea snails.

I have one (I think) cherith snail left (killed most of them with flatworm exit), and that is a trouble free snail. I'll be ordering a pile of them in the next month or so. They don't do much individually, so an army is needed.

I've never tried margarita snails, as I've read that marine tanks are too warm for them: apparently they're a temperate species. I haven't tried trochus, as I had read that they can't right themselves.

Nassarius are trouble free, too.

[Doug]

Yes, I have heard that on margarita snails. Question is, why the heck are they listed then. At least a larger amount of them are surviving.

However, as first stated, the astrea snails I purchased are almost all gone. Even the ones I flip back are just lifeless. The half dozen trochus are all fine.

Between the snail losses and my 3 peppermints not making it very long, its really a depressing invert order.

On a good note, the tuzedo urchin did a great job on some of the red turf algae I have. And my pair of brittle stars learned in a hurry to come up the side to get some pellets for lunch. Without the sand bed now however, I may have to sell one.

[FitoPharmer]

The astreas in my tank seem to be able to flip themselves after they fall on the sand. I had the same problem with a previous batch of 10 or so astreas I bought. They seemed on deaths doorstep when I took them out of the bag, every few hours one would fall off the glass and not have the strength to get back up. Within a few weeks they were all dead.