Can Mystery Snails Eat Peas?

Last Updated on January 20, 2021 by cmoarz

Frozen peas are a hit and miss when it comes to satiating the appetites of mystery snails. Some snails will love them, some will not even touch them. I’m not entirely sure if it’s a species thing or just an individual snail thing. Someone should look into that.

Either way, the peas themselves are pretty good for snails. They are one of the highest sources of calcium in vegetables although kale and collard greens are much higher on that list.

So they do make a good addition to your snail’s varied and wide diet. There are a few things you should know before giving them peas, so continue reading before rushing off to your kitchen.

Preparing peas for your snails

Preparing peas is a bit of a time-consuming process. It involves removing the outer layer of skin on each individual pea. If you don’t do this, the skins will end up just floating around your tank like litter in the ocean.

If you have some larger fish, they might decide to clean up the empty pea husks. But in all likely hood, you will have fish in your tank that won’t touch them. So it’s best to remove them ahead of time to avoid clogged filters, and rotting pea husks fouling up your tank.

I’ve looked high and low for an easier way to do this, Maybe something automated. I haven’t found anything. So I’ll explain the best and quickest way you can do this, although it’s still going to be slow. Sorry.

Frozen peas work the best for this. It’s easy to remove the pea skin after they’ve had a little time to defrost. What’s left is the green mush that your mystery snail is going to adore.

This green mush should fall to the bottom no problem, But if your having problems with it floating, consider re-freezing the mush.

You can also take your pea mush and mix any additional nutrients you might want your snails to be eating. A bit of extra calcium is always a good choice, Just don’t overdo it!

Stick them back in the freezer for an easy to reach snack in the future too.

Can you feed the pea pods to snails?

I personally don’t do this. Although there shouldn’t be anything wrong or poisonous about the peas pods, I tend not to give them to my snails. For one thing, they’re pretty tough.

They would definitely need to be blanched before your snails would be able to get a good bite out of them.

Admittedly one of the major reasons I don’t do this is because I don’t need to, As snails already have a varied diet. I also rarely have bean pods on hand. Who does?

The fact is, buying bags of frozen peas is just easier and cheaper. It’s already labor-intensive enough with all that shelling.

Unless you’re also an avid gardener, Then it’s your call. If you do decide to give them the pods fresh from your garden, remember to clean them very very well, and make sure theirs no critters hiding inside.

The last thing you want is a pesticide gets into your snail tank. That would be quite disastrous.