doing something wrong? fulicas

[LisaLQ]

I'm not overly concerned, as all (apart from Ebay) are eating well and nice and fat. But my fulicas have now stopped growing. All bar Cooper (who is about 11cm I think - but has decided to now grow width ways instead of length!) are under 9cm, two of my rescue ones from Kathy/Ruth's bunch are only 6cm (give or take half a cm) with no new growth, one of them is 8cm, Widget's 6cm but has a small amount of growth (he's one of the two ones who had/have a ridged shell since before I got them), Fidget (the other - whose ridged shell went back to smooth with her new growth since being here) is about 8cm and has just about stopped growing...etc etc.

All are plenty warm enough (room temp is usually 26c) and sprayed with liquid calcium once or twice a day as/when necessary, they get a varied diet, and plenty of snail mix (or porridge, or chick mash, or a mixture!).

So how come I dont have any whopper fulicas? Are they destined to stay small forever? I've been hoping I'd get a couple more biggies out of these lot - and they've just stopped.

I keep seeing piccies of folks fulicas which are 12cm+ and wishing I had one!

Pics - Cooper's the ginormous one. Well, compared to the others anyway!



Fidget and Cooper


Clover (left) who is one of the smaller rescues at 6cm, and Coco next to her who is 8cm and from the same bunch.


Any ideas/suggestions?

[LisaLQ]

Ps. I dont care what the caresheets say - my fulicas are by far the fussiest and hardest to please of all of my different species!

[Arno]

It either could be something genetic,or your snails grow in spurts and this might be the time they're taking it easy.

[goose]

Well they all look beautiful whatever their size. I can't take credit for the size of Um Shlop but I would think it may be genetic? Also looking at the stripes on him and Zebedee I wonder because of their housing they have been growing in small amounts over a long period of time - hence the many narrow stripes of growth - this would fit in with the sporadic feeding they have had and the dry conditions which probably caused them to be dormant at times. Maybe you are doing so well with yours and spoiling them and they have 'peaked' earlier or their growth has slowed down for a bit as Arno said. Having said that I am not advocating starving them or anything - I think there is probably quite a bit of inbreeding going on with some types of snail particularly if people are keeping them in large numbers and not separating offspring or out crossing so the genetic thing is probably most likely.

[ness]

It's prob genetic? All of mine are 8-10 cm, they are from one batch of eggs. I had a load hatch from another batch two weeks later that only reached 4-5 c.m. then died aged around two years. Oh well, as long as yours are healthy I wouldn't worry, best not to breed from them though.

[LisaLQ]

I dont breed from fulicas anyway, far too many about as it is

Thanks though - you've set my mind at ease

[goose]

but not far too many huge ones it seems

[LisaLQ]

I dont mind buying them, just dont want to hatch any I wouldn't have homes for. And as the only interest I've had in babies has been with Cooper, who has since gone on to have a ruptured mantle, I think it's best left to those breeding from good examples. If at all.

But no, there's not enough biggies about. Otherwise I'd have one ;D

[asnailspace]

i have the same kinda problem,with only one of my fulicas growing larger, i have seperated 2 into single tanks for some family (trying to get the younger nephews interested) and they are booming, my ones are just showing real slow growth, after really booming at the start.....pics to follow shortly