Insane outbreak of hundreds of small snails

[TheBeta100]

A few months ago I noticed a few small snails, I then moved to college and came home for bi weekly maintenance, my parents were happy to do the rest.
During that time I never noticed the snails getting worse, until tonight (I’m staying here for a bit during my winter break). I decided to look at my tank with a red light and I actually gasped.
I haven’t noticed any bad things will corals, minus a frogspawn head that got bullied by my blenny. I’m worried that they will become a problem, if they haven’t already caused a hidden one.
Does anyone know what they are? And should I start picking them out? I’m home for a while and I feel I could make a significant dent on their population over the next few weeks.

 

[AllanPritchard]

If they are Trochus snails then don’t worry. They feed on algae and a good little money spinner selling then as CUC. Their population self regulates if the food source drops.

At one point I counted over 200 little ones in my tank but very few make it to adulthood

cheers
Al

 

[hds4216]

Do you have any pics under white light? Really hard to see with the red.

 

[vsolovyev]

If you are noticing these snails at night, you may be seeing collinistia snails. Very common, and there are usually a bunch of them. Good thing for your tank and good night time cuc.

 

[hds4216]

I agree that it could be Collonista snails. See here for more info:

Collonista Snail | Melev's Reef

The subject of this picture is the tiny snail in the dead center. It is a Collonista amakusaensis, which is quite a mouthful for such a tiny guy. It is about the size of a BB, and is hiding in the shade of an Astrea above. These tend to come in as hitchhikers, and breed quite easily. If you look...

www.melevsreef.com

 

[TheBeta100]

Ah thanks I’ll look into them, and I’ve tried to get a picture before but they were so tiny you could barely see it. They look a bit bigger now so if I see them tonight I’ll try and get a picture of them again but in white light.

 

[Jeeperz]

They look like limpets

 

[TheBeta100]

The more I look at them the more I think I agree they are limpets, I’ve seemed to find conflicting info on them, I’ll try and get a bigger one that you can see in a picture too. Should I panic and start removing them? Or leave them be? Or does it depend on a specific ID?

 

[Jeeperz]

I have limpets in my tanks, they actually seem to hang out in the dumps with only a couple in the display. They never get bigger than a pencil eraser and don't seem to bother anything so I leave them. I've also heard bad things about some so maybe the ones I have are not bad.

 

[polyppal]

You could make a wrasse very happy in that tank...

 

[ReefBeta]

Limpets are annoying, they get to everywhere, especially in sump. I have tons in my tank. They're safe in term of hurting coral. But I worry someday they will get into some pump and stuck it, get into the check valve and render it unless, etc. But not like there is good way to get rid of them so I just let them be, and be prepared if something falls.

 

[Topekoms]

If they are Trochus snails then don’t worry. They feed on algae and a good little money spinner selling then as CUC. Their population self regulates if the food source drops.

At one point I counted over 200 little ones in my tank but very few make it to adulthood

cheers
Al

Not trocus those are limpets. Harmless

 

[Rednamalas]

Yeah, I have about a million limpets in my 75 DT, even with a longnose hawk and two 5" cardinalfish, I still see a bunch, but they seem to be harmless and they have never bothered any of my corals.

 

[sfin52]

They will eat corline. I consider tham harmless

 

[fuelman]

limpets. they don't look like the keyhole type, so harmless other than they can populate pretty heavy.