[Cyphro]

I was doing a water change and noticed these half inch diameter clams. At first I thought that they were just dead shells but they have clamped onto some moss and there are at least half a dozen of them. The shell is rather elongated. Looks like a fingernail clam except that it is much elongated. Shell is fairly thick, much heavier than a clam shrimp. Anyone have any ideas?

Must have been here a really long time without my noticing, so have no idea how it got in there.

I will try to upload a pic if necessary but I may not have the cable I need.

 

[Deeda]

Have you brought in any plants from local waterways?

 

[Cyphro]

No, I have plants in the tank (and used to have many more) but nothing from the wild. These clams are pretty big too. Actually more like one inch for some of them. So wherever they came from they must have been in there for a very long time. Been looking at pics for hours but nothing looks similar.

 

[Deeda]

Single shell or double shell?

Take a look at Asian clams if double shell.

 

[Cyphro]

Not sure what that means but it looks similar to some mussels in shape, but I have seen similar shells at the beach many times. So it is probably some kind of estuary mussel I guess. I can't imagine they are filter feeders, I don't think there is enough to eat for a bunch of clams. Who knows though.

 

[mambee]

Limpets?

 

[Cyphro]

They don't look like a limpets and they can close up. The one I pulled up ended up dying so I threw it out. There were a few more but I can't find them now.

 

[fmueller]

There are more types of freshwater mussels than most people would believe. I used to live in Ohio and walked my dog along the Cuyahoga on a regular basis. Since I like poking around in the water, I frequently found mussels, some astoundingly large. One day I bumped into a guy who also took an interest in them. Turns out he was doing his PhD thesis on freshwater molluscs, and had identified seven different types of mussels in less than half a mile of river. I had one in my African cichlid tank for quite a while, but eventually the cichlids found it. ;-)