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Notopala sp?


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Good news I am seeing all three snails more regularly in their usual haunts, so it looks like they have settled into tank life well.

After having done more reading up on them (as a species not N. sublineata alisoni personally) it seems they really do need a mature well established tank because it appears they feed on biofilm like otocinclus rather than actual organic matter like the usual pest snails. They certainly show no real interest in any of the foods that all the other snails go ape over, but then my native shrimp are also not that crazed about any prepared foods and prefer just picking through the mulm.

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WhooHooo best haul YET!!!!!

In about 1 hr of scooping through weed, mud, sand in and around rocks and logs we found 4 ! Notopala snails. The other half even braved dipping his toes in the water and found one. These new 4 are much bigger than my existing 3 and so far I should be able to tell most of them apart, especially the biggest of the bunch,

pictures to follow later.....

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As promised photos

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and the biggest one of the 4

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So far I am having real problems finding any really useful information on this type of snail, they are not even as far as I can tell officially recorded as being in Rockhampton or the Fitzroy river. They are however recorded as being further west and I can only guess that they got to Rockhampton via our many floods.

So far I have found that they have absolutely no interest in any prepared foods. In fact one of the snails "Bolt" who I deliberately dropped an algae wafer in front of, touched it with his antennae 3 times and each time pulled back away with a quick jerking motion like the wafer had hurt him, then changed direction and sulked by burying himself in the substrate. Where as the Ramshorn snails, Malaysian Trumpet Snails and pond snails all bee lined towards the algae wafer. The native shrimp, mainly Blackmore River Shrimp tend to wait until the snails have started destroying the algae wafers before coming and joining the living scrum of snails all eating the food.

I will get some more nori sheets and see if the notopala snails show any interest in them, since I know the nerite snails loved eating the nori sheets.

Another thing I have found is that the snails are very aware of any disturbances in the tank, even if you did not put your hand any where near them. One of the snails was munching its way along the front glass of the tank, and I needed to move something in the tank, but not actually near the snail. It reacted by pulling into its shell, but did not release off the glass. When I had finished in the tank it quickly resumed it nibbling across the glass. I am wondering if this quick reaction to something disturbing the water is what makes these snails doubly hard to find. Not only do they bury in the mud/sand/silt but when they detect a possible threat freeze and possibly dig to hide quite quickly. I have observed the snails bury themselves and it is pretty quick considering their size, its very similar to how an echidna will just melt into soil when threatened.

Even with a known 7 snails in the tank, they are still incredibly hard to find within the tank. But they don't seem concerned by the tank lights and will blissfully roam about the tank, appearing and disappearing throughout the day.

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  • 5 months later...

Thought it was time for an update.

The original Notopala snails I collected seem to have disappeared, but they could be hiding in the substrate since I don't tend to disturb it.

However after our recent minor floods here tonnes of water hyacinth and water cabbage have washed down stream and been left high and dry on the banks of river. I was mowing near the high water line of left over from the flood and water and the sludgy sticky muddy silt and happened to get a large clump of water hyacinth tangled up in the mower shoot. When I went to remove the water hyacinth I happened to see a notopala snail tucked away in the mat of roots. Upon closer inspection the snail was alive so I then had a bit of a hunt around mostly through my smoko break and found 25 more notopalas all trying to hide in the shallow silty mud that wont see water again until another flood.

Hubby and I went back that afternoon after work and found even more snails, considering how many snails we found in one small area of river bank I shudder to think how many more have been left high and dry let alone how many others have been washed down through the barrage into the salt water to die. I can only guess it would have to be in the millions.

The other  thing  with finding so many I have managed to get some really large ones which every other time I had gone snail hunting in the water all the large snails where always dead.

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Couldn't resist putting up this photo I took last night of this shrimplet patrolling one of the large notopala snails.

It really was wondering up and down the length of the snail (I have the blurry pictures to prove it LOL), but this photo was the only one to turn out clearly. In my mind he is saying "Tally Ho"

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You would probably be surprised about what snails are wild around Brisbane. I only stumbled upon this species because curiosity about some dead shells I had seen got me searching. From there I managed to actually find them and the other long black shelled snails. Bob said the best way to find some snail species is to search at night (not an option really in muddy croc waters), but I find netting through thick weeds, looking under and around rocks or logs and even scooping up the mud/sand in the water yields some interesting finds.

I guess my adage is "Seek and Ye Shall Find" and patience is a virtue. Trust me when I was scooping through the mud 6 months ago I was incredibly lucky to find 7 snails and that took a lot of hours to achieve that number and a very sore back

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well it looks as though we are due to get another flood here, and I will be watching to see if the water breaks the banks again (it should I think around 6m is due to arrive), in which case I  am sure more notopala snails will be left high and dry again to die on the banks of the river.

Yesterday I was really surprised to see a notopala roaming about on a bit of concrete wall that was slowly getting submerged with the raising flood water. I had never actually seen them wondering around in the wild before, only previously found them by scooping a net through mud around plants and structure like fallen trees. So seeing this one going about his natural business was interesting.

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And this is why I love these snails, such pretty unique patterns

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  • 2 weeks later...

Just had to share another picture of one of these great snails

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I need to source some more native snails at some stage. They are awesome to just look at doing their thing.

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I think nearly every single snail that I rescued has gone and had babies (well all the female ones that is) because I now have baby notopalas in all the tanks they went into. Goodness only knows what kind of population explosion has happened in the pond where I put all the excess ones. But I dare say that sometime in the future if all the babies grow up I will be needing to spread out their numbers in other peoples tanks.

Its a shame that a lot of people as soon as they here mention of snail they think of the pest species or boring old Apple/ Mystery.

Just for you some more of the native gems.

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When it comes time to thin the numbers I think I will be happy to give them away just people pay the postage. At least then they will be getting a little better known.

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When it comes to spreading them out I will probably make a EOI thread, then I can let people know how many there are approx. size and find out how many people want. I know if anyone is hoping to breed them then more is best just so you get a better chance of males and females.

I with all these babies I will be very interested to see if any develop the dark shells or if they all stay light yellow with a hint of green. For now all the babies seem to just have pale nondistinct colour shells.

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