Himalayan Rabbit Snail

Care at a glance

Overview

The Himalayan rabbit snail is a small Sulawesi snail with a patterned shell that grazes quietly over wood, rock, and sand for algae, biofilm, and detritus. It is peaceful and pays no attention to tankmates, so it settles in well with community fish and shrimp, and it is content kept singly. Like its relatives it wants warm, hard, alkaline water and a soft bed to forage through, and it must never meet copper, which poisons snails. It breeds only slowly, one live baby at a time, so numbers stay in check. A tank of 40 liters or more gives it room to roam.

In the wild

Despite the trade name, this snail is not from the Himalayas at all but from Sulawesi in Indonesia, where rabbit snails live nowhere else. Its home waters run warm and hard with an alkaline pH, so a tank should sit from about 25 to 30 c with a pH between 7 and 8.5. A deep layer of soft sand is important, as the snail spends much of its time plowing through it for food. Stable minerals and clean, well-filtered water keep it healthy and its shell intact.

Good to know

Tylomelania marwotoae is a described Sulawesi species in the family Pachychilidae, one of many rabbit snails still uncommon in the hobby. It stays fairly small at around 5 cm, with the long, whorled shell and horny trapdoor typical of the group. It is a livebearer, releasing a single well-developed juvenile at a time instead of egg clutches. Because that output is so low and the young grow slowly, deliberately breeding a colony is rated hard.

Did you know

Rabbit snails are among the very few aquarium snails that give birth to live young one at a time. A female may go weeks between babies, so even a group grows into a colony only very gradually.

Related species

• 

  Triangle Rabbit Snail

  Tylomelania sinabartfeldi

  2 in (5 cm)5 gal (20 L)75–86°F (24–30°C)

• 

  Gold Rabbit Snail

  Tylomelania gemmifera

  2.8 in (7 cm)16 gal (60 L)75–82°F (24–28°C)

• 

  White Spotted Rabbit Snail

  Tylomelania towutica

  4.3 in (11 cm)16 gal (60 L)75–84°F (24–29°C)
• Pagoda Snail

  Brotia pagodula

  2.4 in (6 cm)5 gal (20 L)72–82°F (22–28°C)

• 

  Black Devil Snail

  Faunus ater

  3.9 in (10 cm)13 gal (50 L)72–86°F (22–30°C)

• 

  Giant Colombian Ramshorn

  Marisa cornuarietis

  2 in (5 cm)5 gal (20 L)73–81°F (23–27°C)