Something is killing my snails.

[Linden the noob]

Hi everyone,

This is my first post.

So I have a innovative marine 30l, I have yellow watchman, purple fire fish, small clown, lawnmower blenny,emerald carb(small) and a cleaner shrimp. I have many corals(zoa's and some LPS)

There is a USA current IC for lighting. 500gph on main flow and then a power head at 2000lph. I'm also running desk size innovative marine ghost skimmer. Chemipure nano bags and in one chamber I have set up a small refugium with cheto and rock (loads of pods living there)

The tank is about 4 months old only thing I have lost is snails and small hermit crabs. All shells have had a small hole in the top. Had a very large turbo snail and that just stop moving one day. Now only have 4 trocus.

9kg of red sea live sand 2 kg of Fiji live rock and 7 kg of pukni dry rock.

Temp 25.6
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 10 ppm
pH. 8.1
Salinity 1.025
Alk 11

Hope that's enough info.

[ReefkeeperZ]

sounds like a predatory sea star is roving your tank they can chew a small hole and shove their stomach inside to digest the prey.

[ReefkeeperZ]

use a red light at night to inspect your tank looking for sea stars it could be quite small

[OrionN]

Sound like you have a predatory snail that bore a hole into their prey to eat them. Look for one smaller snail that climb on to another and hang on for long time.

[Linden the noob]

Ok thanks for the info. I have a very small white starfish but that came on a frag about 2 weeks ago. Snails went missing before that. Would any of these hunt hermit carbs as well?

[Python73]

Easy fix: take a piece of RAW meat (shrimp, fish, etc) and rubber band it to a small rock so your fish can't move it. Leave it on your sand after lights out and go away for an hour or two. Check back with a flashlight. If you have a killer snail he'll be on the meat. Plus or minus some surprising things you probably didn't think were in your tank.