Can Mystery Snails Eat Carrots?

Last Updated on January 20, 2021 by cmoarz

Mystery snails, Can they eat carrots? Yup! they can. Do they like them? Well, that’s not much of a ‘mystery’, yes they definitely do! At least… some of them do.

Just because carrots can be safe for the snails to consume doesn’t mean every snail will. There are a lot of variables when it comes to how choosy your snail is going to be.

Water temperature is especially the big one. If the water is warm, You may see your snail gobble up its carrot-like it hasn’t eaten in a week. That’s because his metabolism has gone into hyperdrive.

If the water is too cold, You may notice your snail eats a lot less and does very little in the way of movement. That’s because his metabolism has slowed down a great amount in the cold temperatures. He simply doesn’t need that excess food at this time and he may turn his nose up at the carrot.

And of course, sometimes a snail just won’t like to eat carrots. They may prefer other types of veggies like zucchini. Snails are a lot like cats in that regard.

But if your curious to find out if your snail will like carrots, hears how you prepare them:

Preparing carrots for your mystery snail

First, wash your carrots well so you don’t introduce anything undesirable into the tank.

When cutting your carrots to size, take into account the size of your snail. Snails have small mouths, so don’t cut them too big. Don’t go overboard and cut them too small, either.

Once cut, You will need to blanch your carrots. This has 2 effects. The first, it will make it much easier for your snails to consume the carrot as it will become much softer.

Second, It allows the carrot to sink to the bottom of the tank rather than float on top of the surface. This will deliver the food straight to the snails and make their lives easier.

You could also just place them on a dry surface where your snails might like to gather and feed after blanching.

To do this, simply microwave them in 5 second bursts until soft. You could also boil them for a couple minutes however it’s not necessary to do so if you have a microwave.

How you feed them really just depends on the type of tank set up you have and the type of snails you have. The important thing here to remember is the blanching, So feed them however you wish.

The type of carrot you chose should have a lot of calcium in it.

There are a lot of varieties and species of carrot, But some have more calcium than others. Your snail needs a steady diet in calcium in order to maintain shell health and to help it continue to grow.

Regular store-bought carrots per 100 g have about, 33 mg calcium. It also has a healthy dose of ascorbic acids, protein, fat, iron, zinc, manganese, magnesium, phosphorus, and potassium.

Snails need a varied diet, you can’t just feed them carrots

In order for the snail to get everything she needs, you will have to provide a large and varied diet. Just feeding carrots would be negative and may cause her to die.

While carrots make a good part in that variety, that’s all they should be, 1 part.

Remember to also feed her lettuce, kale, proteins like shrimp and snail pellets. It doesn’t hurt to add plants specifically for your snails to feed from to your aquarium, as well as their typical every day diet of algae.

And most importantly, do not feed starches, or any vegetable with any trace amounts of copper in it.