{"product_id":"cerith-snail-small","title":"Cerith Snail","description":"\u003cp\u003eCerith Snails (\u003cem\u003eCerithium\u003c\/em\u003e sp.) do their best work while you're asleep — nocturnal by nature, they spend the night moving methodically through the sand bed and over rockwork, breaking down detritus and consuming diatoms, cyanobacteria, and decaying organic matter before it enters the nitrogen cycle as a nitrate precursor. By day they mostly stay buried in the sand or tucked into rockwork, so they contribute more to tank health than their daytime invisibility suggests.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThey're one of the more genuinely useful sand bed cleaners in a reef cleanup crew because they work the interface between sand surface and water column where a lot of organics accumulate — the zone that nassarius snails go deeper than and hermit crabs stay above. That ecological niche specificity means a mixed cleanup crew with cerith snails, nassarius snails, and hermit crabs covers the full range of sand bed maintenance more completely than any single species alone.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThey don't need target feeding in an established reef — the natural organic load in a typical reef tank is more than sufficient. In a bare or newly established system, occasional small amounts of sinking food placed at night help sustain them while the biological load builds up.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eScientific name:\u003c\/strong\u003e Cerithium sp. (several species sold as \"cerith snail\" in the trade)\u003cbr\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eOrigin:\u003c\/strong\u003e Tropical Indo-Pacific and Caribbean — sandy reef zones, seagrass beds, and intertidal sand flats\u003cbr\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eWater parameters:\u003c\/strong\u003e Temp 72–80°F · Salinity 1.023–1.026 · pH 8.1–8.4\u003cbr\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eTank requirements:\u003c\/strong\u003e 10 gal minimum; live sand substrate recommended\u003cbr\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eDiet:\u003c\/strong\u003e Herbivore\/detritivore — algae, diatoms, cyanobacteria, detritus, and decaying organic matter\u003cbr\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eCompatibility:\u003c\/strong\u003e Reef safe; peaceful with all species; hermit crabs may target them for their shells\u003cbr\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eHusbandry note:\u003c\/strong\u003e Stock cerith snails at roughly 1–2 per 5 gallons of tank volume as a starting point. Overstocking any single cleanup crew species creates competition for food that leads to die-offs — a diverse crew at moderate density outperforms a large single-species crew.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"YoCamron's Aquatics","offers":[{"title":"Small \/ Wild-Caught","offer_id":50337300349165,"sku":"TSNAI5003","price":3.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Small \/ 5-Pack \/ Wild-Caught","offer_id":50339101671661,"sku":"TSNAI5003-5N","price":17.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Small \/ 10-Pack \/ Wild-Caught","offer_id":50339101704429,"sku":"TSNAI5003-10N","price":34.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0806\/1032\/8813\/files\/lg91080CerithSnail_600x600_fa4e4c7a-211e-40ee-a2d1-0a564482e83d.jpg?v=1784692372","url":"https:\/\/www.yocamronsaquatics.com\/products\/cerith-snail-small","provider":"YoCamron's Aquatics","version":"1.0","type":"link"}