Malaysian trumpet snail
Melanoides tuberculata
easy careOverview
Malaysian trumpet snails (Melanoides tuberculata), or MTS, are slender cone-shaped snails that spend the day burrowing through the substrate and emerge at night. Almost always arriving as plant hitchhikers, they’re divisive: superb substrate-aerators and detritus cleaners on one hand, prolific breeders on the other. Understood and fed correctly, they’re a genuinely useful part of a planted tank’s clean-up crew. Many aquascapers value them precisely because they keep a deep substrate from going stagnant, quietly doing under the sand the same job a gravel cleaner does on top of it.
Tank & water
A 19 litre (5 gallon) tank suits them, and they do best over a soft sand or fine gravel substrate they can burrow through:
- A burrowable substrate — sand or fine gravel lets them aerate and clean deep in the bed.
- A cycled tank — cycle fully; they still dislike ammonia and nitrite.
- Harder, alkaline water — pH above 7 with some hardness keeps their shells solid.
- No copper — lethal to snails and shrimp; check medication and fertiliser labels.
Feeding
MTS are detritivores that eat leftover food, decaying plant matter and algae buried in the substrate, so a normal tank feeds them without any deliberate effort. Extra food is almost never needed; every surplus scrap simply fuels faster breeding, so feed the tank sparingly. Because they work mostly out of sight, the first sign of overfeeding is often a sudden crowd of them on the glass at night — a useful early warning that you’re putting in more food than the tank consumes.
Tankmates & breeding
MTS are entirely peaceful and mix with any community fish, shrimp and snails. They’re livebearers that reproduce readily and prolifically, so populations grow quickly in a well-fed tank. If numbers get out of hand, feed less and add an assassin snail, which preys on them.
Compare with the coiled ramshorn snail and see the aquarium substrate guide.
Malaysian trumpet snail — frequently asked questions
Are Malaysian trumpet snails good or bad?
Mostly good. They burrow through the substrate by day, eating detritus and aerating the sand or gravel, which helps prevent harmful anaerobic pockets. The downside is they breed readily and, in an overfed tank, can reach large numbers — but that's driven by excess food, not the snails.
Do Malaysian trumpet snails hide during the day?
Yes — they're mainly nocturnal and burrow into the substrate in daylight, so a tank can look snail-free until the lights go off and dozens emerge. This burrowing is actually their main benefit, keeping the substrate turned over and aerated.
How do I get rid of Malaysian trumpet snails?
They're hard to fully eliminate because they burrow and breed prolifically. The practical route is control, not eradication: feed less to slow breeding, remove them at night when they surface, and consider an assassin snail, which hunts and eats them.
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