[LongTimeAquarist]

I'm planning on adding either shrimp, snails or both into a 20gal Fish tank, which right now contains only a male betta, along with some other fish. I'm also going to buy a pre-filter sponge so that nothing gets sucked up into my power filter. What I'm looking for is not only the pros and cons of each option, I'm also something that would not only try to escape my tank, but also won't try to eat my pre-filter which would turn my power filter into some kind of vacuum cleaner. Any suggestions? Right now I'm thinking of assassin snails and ghost shrimp, but only if they are a good mix, other wise it would one of the two.

 

[FrightyDog]

There is a high, almost definite, chance that the shrimp would be hunted and eaten or at least attacked by the betta. They are carnivorous and will eat just about any meat you feed them. I had a 1 gallon (i was a newbie to fish don't judge me i would never do it again) and put a ghost shrimp all by itself since it was a feeder, but i put a lionfish in an uncycled tank x/ (i set up the tank and threw him in the next second.) and it died. So i had 4 ghost shrimp. I just got a betta a week later and put one shrimp in then added the betta. No problems. Sweet. I put the biggest one and it did fine. I added the other three a week later (the first one was doing fine). Within the day they all died. Except the original. So I am not sure if it is a territory thing, but be warned about shrimp. Snails could work fine though.

 

[LongTimeAquarist]

Actually it might be a lack of room since a 1 gal tank might be a bit cramp for both. Probably would have had better luck with something bigger like a 5 gal tank.

 

[FrightyDog]

Actually it might be a lack of room since a 1 gal tank might be a bit cramp for both. Probably would have had better luck with something bigger like a 5 gal tank.

True. I put some cherry shrimp with a tiger barb and bought an area for them to hide in. Poor guys got destroyed

 

[LongTimeAquarist]

At least you didn't mix the tiger barb with the betta or else the betta would be history.