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Painting Snails
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Posted by uninformed_kitty (My Page) on Tue, Apr 4, 06 at 0:44
| I thought about painting my snails the way they do with hermit crabs, and after reading around, it seems that it's perfectly harmeless to them, and people use the clear nail enamle to help repair shells.
But now the problem is if it's safe for fish. My first guess would be that it isn't, but I figure it's best to see if anyone has any experience with this before giving up.
I thought about using fish-safe paint, but would that harm the snails' shells? I didn't find any info on that. (I don't see why it would, but there's no sense taking chances.)
Right now I tell them apart by the algae growing on them, but I think it would be nice to clean them up and decorate them. =^_^= Give 'em little stars and whatnot. |
Follow-Up Postings:
RE: Painting Snails
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| First the surface has to be dry for the paint to stick. Then the paint has to dry. By this time the snail would be quite dead. Most likely the paint would peel off after being submerged for a period of time anyway. Don't know what damage, if any it would do to the shell. |
RE: Painting Snails
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| Well, they're apple snails, so they can survive out of water for quite a long time. (In fact, I intend to bring them out later to see if they'd like some lettuce.) I've read about breeders identifying males with blue nail polish and females with pink nail polish. But the problem is that all of these people keep the apple snails by themselves as pets, not with fish. I guess I'll give up on the idea. I wouldn't want to hurt my fishies over something so trivial. |
RE: Painting Snails
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| A marine grade epoxy would be the best choice if you where going to do it. The epoxy paint becomes inert after it dries. Keep reasearching it, maybe look for a snail forum and see what breeders say. Post if you find anything out. |
RE: Painting Snails
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| I had an apple snail crawl out of a tank and sit behind the stand for 3-4 days. I put him back in the tank and he was right as rain in a couple hours. I hear that they can survive for upto a week out of water. |
RE: Painting Snails
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| Yeah, it's true. Apparently some of the places they live will dry up sometimes, so they have a lung, and their trap door keeps them from drying out. They lay their eggs above the surface, too, save for a few species. As it turns out, mine are probably another type of snail that's often confused with apple snails, but I'm still not sure. I have no new word on the painting. The lady at the pet store hadn't heard of it before, and she's not sure what any kind of paint would do to the shell. (Fish aren't really her forte. Perhaps the guy would have known more.) |
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