Apollo has black shell?

[picklepies]

Hi all, my little Apollo's seems to have an issue with her shell. She's a bit little, but a great character, doing everything a snailie should, just in miniture.

Well I noticed his morning her shell seems to be going black/dark in places, it wasn't like this Friday when I last had her out, so it's come on fairly quickly.

I've given her a bath, and it does t seem to be dirt, but s part of her shell? She's eating cuttlefish and food and snailie happily, I just wanted to see if anyone knew why this has happened?

She is super inbred, and seems to have stopped growing at about 7cm shell length, if that could be a possibility?
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Just an edit to give an idea of her size compared to the other fulica. Apollos around 11 month old, the rest are all between 3-5, no idea if this has any weight to the black forming in her shell though
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[etana]

Well the fulica shell seems to change colours on occasion. I don't really know why, but with darker individuals I have seen an originally green shell right out turn red, for example. Apollo's seems to be changing in places of old damage. Just to be sure all is ok, keep vitamin D available once a week on average (egg yolk works well).

Some snails with stunted growth do seem to get odd shell issues. As for inbreeding it takes a LOT of it with snails before actual issues appear, but it does happen.

[picklepies]

Ah thank you I got worried as I've never seen anything like it! Green to red sounds very Christmasy
All the snailie get egg on Wednesdays, and as my sweetie I always make sure Apollo gets a good share of it, could it be something related to calcium uptake? X

[etana]

Lol apparently we're both editing our posts at the same time.

Since you have the good egg day routine, I don't think it's really about calcium uptake. Is she pooping normally too?

Editing again to add that try to see if her next poop is black (normal, means she's been eating soil to help with digestion). It could be showing through her shell and making it look darker than it actually is.

[picklepies]

Lol great minds and all that XD I shall be on poop watch for ye next week, hopefully it's just poop

[jolovessnailies]

I am so sorry hunni, I didn't see this, I am sure she is fine and there is nothing to worry about.

Hugs
JO xx

[Zorst]

Just a thought as its around old damage the damp dirt from the floor of the tank may be getting in bettween layers of the shell. It may be worth cleaning the shell thoroughly with warm water n a tooth brush to try n remove it n see whats going on.

Once that's done dry the area well with kitchen towel and prehaps and seal it with something like some melted natural bees wax, this can be smoothed off and shouldnt harm the snail if it manages to rasp any off but could seal over the area if there is damage there n muck getting into it. That way you stablise the shell and allow it time to grow over and heal as your keeping it dry. The melted bees wax could be reapplyed as needed.

I did this with a pretty bad crack on the top of the shell of one of my snails , it worked and the snail wasnt bothered by it, I just repeated it as it was needed until the shell healed.

Zorst

[picklepies]

I'll have a look for natura bee wax, thanks it doesn't appeared to be doing her any harm, just na aesthetic annoyance lol. I have washed it a few times, with a baby toothbrush and it doesn't seem to sift anything, but it also doesn't seem to be getting worse, so that's good