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For some time now, probably in the order of 12-18 months, there have been a number of empty Turbo sp.
shells showing up on the sand bed. Didn't really think too much
of it, but the number has been increasing significantly recently.
Some time ago I spotted two new snails on the glass that don't appear
to be herbivores and spotted them again recently and they had doubled
in size. So, they were eating something and it appears like it
was my Turbo sp. who were on the menu.
For a couple of months I kept an eye out for the snails to make an
appearance again (they only come out at night too), and finally I
managed to catch them out in the open. And in this instance both
of them were together and one of them was laying eggs. Definitely
not something I wanted them doing, two of the buggers was causing
enough havoc on the snail population as it was.
One of the Mitra sp. snails laying egg sacks.
Since that night, I have also found about 6 other small snails of
the same species, with close ups of the shell of one of these below,
throughout the tank. So it appears like they have been successful
at breeding and the increase in the population would correspond nicely
with the fall in the Turbo sp. population.
Close up of the laid egg sacks.
The
things surrounding the egg sacks in the above photograph are small
brittle stars. The tank is literally crawling with thousands of
this species of brittle star. Interesting thing about this
species of brittle star is I have caught them in the various stages of
under going asexual reproduction by splitting in half to produce two
new indivuals.
Close up of the Mitra sp. egg sacks outside of the tank.
Here are two close ups of the snails' shell, from above and
below. They have subsequently been indentified to below to the
Mitra genus, but have not been able to pin them down to a particular
species.
Top view of the Mitra sp. shell.
Bottom view of Mitra sp. shell.
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