Odd snails

[Colour_genes]

Couple of comments here -

It appears the term 'ramshorn snail' can be used in reference to several species of snail with the same general shape of shell. I have both types that are being referred to here in my tanks. The larger species can be had in both red and brown colour morphs and do indeed grow to the size of a 50cent coin or more. They are an ornamental species often offered for sale both through TM / private sale, for instance http://www.trademe.co.nz/pets-animals/f ... 78949.htm; and in some pet stores.

The smaller greyish-brown species however is just basically a nuisance, unless you are wanting it for feeding puffers or loaches etc. They grow to a max size of 3-5mm. It is not particularly attractive, reproduces relentlessly, and is almost impossible to get rid off, I suspect the eggs are extremely resistant to dessication, judging from experiences with some of my tanks.

This is yet another example of the dangers of using common names only to identify any organism, the same common name can be applied to different varieties by people in different countries, cultures or areas, and the risk of confusion or mis-identification is huge.

Your camera - lack of a connector cord should not be a problem. Find the 'SD card' in the camera (the square plastic 'chip' that the images are recorded on) and remove it (with camera turned off!), then either - find the SD card slot in your computer/laptop/tablet and slide the card into place, then the computer should automatically do stuff to help you download your images; or -if there is no SD slot built into your computer you can purchase a 'SD Card Reader' which plugs into your computer via the USB port. Card Readers cost anything from $1 to $25 depending on the type you need (iPad ones for instance are more expensive).

Then you can learn to upload your images from there. I hope that helps.

[JJWooble]

I have seen some 'red ramshorns' for sale in some of the animates in my area, but these seem to be, as mentioned above, the ones that grow quite large. I have quite a few of these ones now, originally got them off a friend as found them quite cute. They reproduce quite readily, and my largest ones atm are about the size of a 20 cent coin. I also have the smaller 'ramshorns' in another of my tanks. These seem to get outcompeted a bit by bladder snails/malaysian trumpet snails so rarely see too many of them unless I'm purposely looking for them lol. Main way I distinguish between the two is just by waiting to see how big they grow as the larger type grows quite quickly

I personally don't consider either a problem, as so far both types only really seemed to eat algae/uneaten fish food/other waste and leave my plants well alone