How to breed stomatella

[CenlaReefer]

I LOVE to get CUC that I can buy once and let them reproduce so that I do not have to buy more.

Here is my stomatella breeding setup. It is a 20 gallon tall tank with well-seasoned, quarantined live rock, a heater, and an airline instead of a powerhead. Powerheads can chop babies. I filtered some waste SW from my main system through a felt filter sock and put it in this tank. There is no sump nor filtration in this tank. I waited for algae to grow before adding about 6 stomatella. There are no fish nor inverts (i.e. crabs) that can eat the stomatella. This is a monoculture tank.

When transferring rock with coral, I did a Bayer pesticide dip to kill any pods that could eat my tiny stomatella babies.

These are the pics I am so VERY excited about!

 

[90addict]

Maybe this is what's breeding in my dt. I feel like over night I had an explosion of baby snails. There's probably 100+ tiny baby snails lol

 

[IceNein]

I got A (1) stomtalla on some frag that I didn't notice, and I wish I had a couple more so I could get them breeding. I do have three limpets, so I'm hoping they make limplets sometime soon.

 

[JonoH]

These and Turbo's seem to breed pretty easily in my main tank.

Would be curious as to what the time frame is from baby to ready to sell...interesting project for sure!

 

[liddojunior]

Woah thats actually so cool. I seem to have tons of baby snails but rarely survive to adulthood. Not enough algae I assume.
Are you sure pods can eat the snails? The snails are waaayyy larger than pods. Maybe Amphipods but arent they detritivores and algae eaters?

 

[braaap]

lol. I have 100s of these annoying things. They are a pest in the quantities they will reproduce at. Their population will rapidly change as well. But I throw dozens away a week.

 

[90addict]

Is that what these are?

 

[liddojunior]

Is that what these are?

Those are trochus snails

stomatella are like slugs but they wear a hat

 

[90addict]

Those are trochus snails

stomatella are like slugs but they wear a hat

Interesting. Well, these snails I have are freaking everywhere! Lol.

 

[JonoH]

Interesting. Well, these snails I have are freaking everywhere! Lol.

These look like Collonista snails (the third pic)

 

[90addict]

These look like Collonista snails (the third pic)

They are freaking everywhere! Lol. Pretty much every dot you see is a baby snail...Sorry if I'm hijacking post

 

[JonoH]

They are freaking everywhere! Lol. Pretty much every dot you see is a baby snail...Sorry if I'm hijacking post

Yep...they can cover everything, you will see them out when the lights are off.

 

[CenlaReefer]

Woah thats actually so cool. I seem to have tons of baby snails but rarely survive to adulthood. Not enough algae I assume.
Are you sure pods can eat the snails? The snails are waaayyy larger than pods. Maybe Amphipods but arent they detritivores and algae eaters?

I am more concerned about amphipods which are a good bit larger than copepods. I have both. I have seen larger ones eat coral and fish food. As you can tell, the stomatella are very tiny when they first hatch. I want to eliminate all risk of them being eaten.

 

[CenlaReefer]

Maybe this is what's breeding in my dt. I feel like over night I had an explosion of baby snails. There's probably 100+ tiny baby snails lol

I have bed the 100+ baby limpets. At first I thought and hoped they were baby trochus, yet someone corrected my wrong assumption. They never get big at all because those "babies" are the mature size.

 

[Louis Z]

I wish I had everyone else’s problem of snails freely populating the tank . I want small brittle stars too .

 

[CenlaReefer]

A while back I put some adults from the breeding tank into my 80 gallon display. I can only find them after lights are out. This one measured over 1 inch long. What is the largest these ever grow for you all?

Here is a top down pic of the same stomatella just below the water's surface.

 

[JonoH]

A while back I put some adults from the breeding tank into my 80 gallon display. I can only find them after lights are out. This one measured over 1 inch long. What is the largest these ever grow for you all?

Here is a top down pic of the same stomatella just below the water's surface.

After reading your post, i moved 4 of my largest Stomatella's into my Frag tank, as my Turbo's in there have been breeding like crazy (as well as in my main tank).

Fast forward a few weeks, noticed Eggs literally everywhere, whenever i lift a frag etc... And now small Stomatella's all over the glass (counted over 20 just on the front and side panel).

Nothing special in the frag tank, its connected to my main system, just no fish in there so there should be no predation of the snails.

 

[CenlaReefer]

Here is an update from today. The round babies attach to the glass and rock and stay put for weeks until they are big enough to start moving around. Once they are more oval and show the tenticles on their head, they slowly start to move. For this reason, I plan to never clean the glass in this breeding tank.

I also have been adding more SW as I do water changes from my main system. I am careful to filter water through a new felt filter sock before adding it to this breeding tank.

 

[fryman]

If you are breeding stomatellas, then gratz! I just get them as hitchhikers and sometimes more appear but I don't get so many it makes a difference, as far as I can tell.

Could be a business, if you figure out how to make lots of them.