# Mourning geckos to combat snails?



## Justin144 (Sep 13, 2014)

I have a 75gal viv about a month old that I re built everything planting wise. Innevetably I have noticed quite a few snails crawling about.Its currently plant only with a very strong dwarf isopods and springtails colony. That being said id rather not have to go through the C02 process. I plan on adding my cobalts into here and was wondering about a mourning gecko or two to add in there. Anyone have experience with mourning geckos? I assume they would snack on snails for the calcium. These are tiny snails.


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## indrap (Aug 28, 2018)

I've kept leucs and mourning geckos together. Just anecdotally, I've personally never seen the geckos eat snails. I see them eat fruit flies often though.

I would recommend just hand picking the snails out when you see them and using beer traps or fruit traps while you haven't got any animals in there. Just stay on top of it and eventually the population of snails will become negligible.


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## Socratic Monologue (Apr 7, 2018)

Sluggo should work for snails. It worked very well for slugs in two of my vivs.

I keep mourning geckos, and I doubt they'd be an effective snail control. They lick fruit, and they'll eat FFs and similar insects, but they're strong sight hunters -- they are attracted by the distinct motion of insect prey.


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## HawpScotch (Oct 4, 2018)

They may, I have pond snails in a tank and I have williamsi that will occasionally eat them. However they don’t hunt them aggressively enough to put a huge dent in their population.


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## Justin144 (Sep 13, 2014)

Thanks for the replies. I have been reading as much as possible the last year about geks and darts. It just seems more reasonable to have geckos that will eat pests, rather than tear apart the viv. That being said does anyone have thoughts or experience with keeping geckos in their dart vivs or vivs at all? I reached out to Joshs frogs and they reccomend mourning geckos the most. My cobalts are still young so it will be a while til i do this. They are in a grow out viv at the moement and i noticed more pests in the big viv, some kinda small worm. Would geckos take care of these at least? Im fine picking snails out w lettuce for now. 
Thanks


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## Socratic Monologue (Apr 7, 2018)

People do keep mourning geckos in vivs similar to those darts are kept in. I don't see any reason to think that MGs have a different insect food preference range than do dart frogs.

I'd caution against thinking that "some kinda small worm" is a pest; there are all sorts of critters making a home in a 'bio-active' viv (they are the 'bio' part), and almost none of them are pests.

I'm sure you've read all the 'mixing' threads here. I'll bet no one has any new thoughts on the matter.


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## Justin144 (Sep 13, 2014)

Ive read all of them lol. Just making sure to take the right precautions before and if i do get Geks. Im just afraid of them reproducing babies non stop. I also get a little paranoid with the pests. I wanna keep my little guys safe you know? Snails are just a nuisance at this point I dont see any plant damage.


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