turtles & snails

Question
I have an aquatic turtle (red ear slider).  The tank gets a lot of algae (turtle & everything in it). I was wondering if I could get a snail to control this.  I hate to use too many chemicals...

Answer
Hi Julie;

Unfortunately, snails are one of the creatures that turtles like to eat. They grab with their mouth and if they can't break the shells they tear them out with their claws. (yuck) Decreasing daylight hours without compromising necessary artificial sunlight or basking time, and changing water more often are a better solution. Here also is a web site with links about keeping turtles that may help;

http://www.turtlecare.net/

There is a section there about algae too under "Turtle Topics". It starts out with info about algae on your tutrle's shell, but goes into algae in the tank too.

At Your Service;
Chris Robbins