A Little About Red Ramshorn Snail Behavior...

My sis asked me today..."Why some of the snails float some doesn't"

Well.....this is what I explained to her, base on my observation...

As far as I know the Red Ramshorn Snail is not 100% aquatic snail. What I mean by this is that, these snails, doesn't have gills so they cannot breath underwater. Instead they have a large pulmonary sac for the gaseous exchange. Under bright light, the sac can be seen like a bubble of air trapped inside the shell.

How the snail breath is by going up to the water surface just like dolphin or whale does. Once they collected enough air, they will then return back into the water. It is like a diver's gas tank, and will last them for few moments (how long exactly I'm not sure, never really observed till that extent)...

Sometimes the snails will spend quite a while floating on the water surface breathing, before entering into the water...during this time, at first glance, you may think that the snail is weak and might be dying or maybe even dead :), but actually they are not!

Here's one interesting observation...

A snail that just fill up their air tank cannot sink, the only way for them to go back into the water is to crawl, with their foot acting like a suction cap, so they will remain underwater. But try picking them, and they will float back up.

The opposite for a snail which have an empty air tank...they will sink right to the bottom if you pick them, and try to crawl back up for air.....:D

Anyway, after knowing about the snail breathing air, they are infact aquatic snails afterall...as they cannot survive without water....try placing them out of water, they will eventually die.