The talk of the smaller species of snails the other week has been resurfacing in my head a little as I've been trying to prepare my tank swaps and thinking about who goes where, and when. I took a few shots today, maybe
@sir_keith can compare some of these to the ones he had pop up. All of these are in their average adult form, sometimes there are larger specimen but those are outliers of the average.
My thinnest population, and smallest species, the "tadpole" snail in leopard coloration. 1/8" to 3/16" is common. These little ones like to walk upside down on the surface tension of the water looking for biofilm and floating crumbs when the tank is otherwise clean. They whip their shell for propulsion, giving a tadpole like appearance from the top down. Once common in all my tanks it can clean the smallest of details. It can be, and is, eaten by all my tetra species and is easily crushed by any of the dwarf cats in my tanks as well. They only currently thrive in one of my tanks.
My most common snail is the leopard colored "ramshorn" snail. Accompanying them are "blue" morphs, they share genetics and I selectively breed them in one of my tiny cylinder tanks. Much like other "blue" snails, they are just a snail lacking most of the shell pigment looking more white than anything, in the common blue actinic lighting they really do look blue, in full spectrum they just look like a skungy calcium deprived snail. These three are from the same breeding pool/generation and share water/food/mineral so diet or acidity is not the case. 1/4"-3/8" average.
The leopard pattern ramshorn do look pretty good in the water under good clean light:
Here's an adult with weaker leopard marking next to a juvenile that will be"blue" as it's pigment is thinning as it grows. It's hard to tell a "blue" as a baby.
Side note: This is why I can't do the long way thread; haven't *ever* cleaned the sides of the tanks on the rack as there isn't enough space to get the magnet between them(and lazy+too many plants). I bet there's a person following this thread itching looking at 5 years of green spot buildup lol.