Do mystery or aquarium snails hibernate?. Aquarium snails are one of the most loved aquarium creatures and people normally use them as pet in their various homes. Due to the level of interest in this creature, there arise a curiosity and question, ” do aquarium snails hibernate?”.Do aquarium/mystery snails hibernate? Yes aquarium or mystery snails do hibernate. They can hibernate for a long period of time, up to 3 years or more, although this is very common for snails in the wild and not for those at home due to many factors.Hibernation is the process of going into a very long sleep due to some reasons. Some Animals normally does this from time to time and for some reasons.
Some animals that does this are rodents, snails etc.There are many reasons why they hibernate or sleep, we will discuss this later.Aquarium snail is a very confusing creature, this is due to the fact that they sometimes play dead, ( as people attribute them) by staying still for a very long time and in various sensitive positions such as staying upside down, floating on water etc.These might develop a feeling and taught in you that the snail or snails are dead, No! Infact, there are many reasons why they do that, such as when they sleep, hibernate, when they hunt for food they float etc, It is very important to check if you snail is dead when it exhibit some of these characters by smelling it etc.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
DO AQUARIUM/MYSTERY SNAILS HIBERNATE? AND WHY
DO AQUARIUM SNAILS SLEEP?
CAN PET AQUARIUM SNAILS SLEEP AND HIBERNATE?
HOW TO TELL IF A SNAIL IS HIBERNATING
DO AQUARIUM/MYSTERY SNAILS HIBERNATE? AND WHY
As we discussed earlier in this topic, yes aquarium snails do hibernate!. Although this greatly depends on the location of the snails habitat.There are some reasons why aquarium snails hibernate, they normally do this when the temperature of the water in which they live in is very cold or when there is a shortage of food, thus in order to survive, they must have to hibernate, thereby allowing themselves to minimize their breathing, heartbeat, digestion of foods which they have already eaten etc, thereby keeping themselves asleep for a very long time and surviving.Normally, they do start or have this long sleep in the winter when everywhere is very cold/frozen, although it depends on the location as I mentioned above, for instance, in the United States, the aquarium snails in the southern states sometimes does not go on a long sleep in the winter because the temperature is okay for them.They made it possible to attain this long sleep by reducing metabolic activity to minimize and save energy, since food is in short supply. Their body temperature is lowered, breathing is slowed, and heart rate is decreased.Aquarium snails could hibernate for a very long time, up to 3 years and sometimes even more or less, depending on how long it takes for the water temperature to increase and also how long food becomes available.You might be wondering, why don’t my pet aquarium snail or snails in the house hibernate?.Like we discussed above, hibernation for water snails greatly depend on their location!.Your pet water snail might not hibernate because the temperature in the house where they are is always normal and they are always fed, so their chance of hibernation is very slim and thus that’s the reason you have not seen them hibernate, nevertheless, they can sleep, but not for a long time. We shall discuss this below.
DO AQUARIUM SNAILS SLEEP?
We have discussed if water snails could hibernate and why, but you might also be wondering if they could also sleep?.Now don’t be confused!, sleep and hibernation are not the same. As we discussed above, hibernation is the act of sleeping for a very very long time by some reasons such as temperature and food and does involve minimizing the body system in order to survive for a long time, but sleep is just a very short period of unconsciousness which is done always and for no main reason and does not involve the minimization of the body system in order to cope.Now to answer the question, “do aquarium snails sleep?” Yes aquarium snails do sleep, but not in the way you might be thinking, they don’t sleep like some animals, due to the fact that their sleeping time frame is a bit longer.Aquarium snails could sleep for about 3 days or more, depending on the particular specie.This is one of the reasons why your snail could not move from a particular place for a long time and why people think that this snail do play dead sometimes.When you notice this, it is not always right to justify they are dead, its best if they are left alone to have their sleep as it is good for them just as it’s good for you too.NOTE – In the case you notice they have slept above average time frame which they should sleep or on an awkward sleeping position, you can check them to make sure they are not dead, because it could affect other snails negatively if left for a long time while dead.Read more on the effects of dead snail on fish/snails
CAN PET AQUARIUM SNAILS SLEEP AND HIBERNATE?
Can pet aquarium snails sleep and also hibernate? Yes pet aquarium snails could sleep but they don’t normally hibernate as the temperature of the room they are kept is not normally favourable for hibernation and also they are normally well fed.So they could sleep but could hardly hibernateAs we have learned, hibernation is often caused by cold and lack of food, we all know that nobody will want to keep his or her pet water snail out doors in the winter or starve his or her pet, so it is very very hard for pet snails to hibernate, but could sleep just fine from time to time.The only snails that could do both of these are those snails in the wild which only live as weather conditions them.
HOW TO TELL IF A SNAIL IS HIBERNATING
Many times, we got confused if the aquarium snails are sleeping or on a hibernation.This is because both of them are very similar and hardly identifiable, but there are clues to know if the creatures are doing any of these, they are:When they are hibernating, they will last far more longer asleep than when they are just sleeping.It has been proven that in about an 18 hours period, mystery snails do normally have up to seven small periods of sleep, which is then followed by 30 hours of activity, but hibernation is very very far from this.They normally sleep in the day time and wake up in the night, when you notice this, it is a sure clue and fact that your snails are not hibernating.Although some of the snails do this, but not all, a good example of snail that sleep in the day is the assassin snail.
CONCLUSION
I greatly hope you have learned quit alot from this article and also we have answered your question ” do aquarium/mystery snails hibernate”.If you find this article helpful, kindly subscribe to my newsletter and share it on social media.