Even though I had a fairly interesting weekend, I am going to talk about snails instead. I have a fish tank, a small 5 gallon one. I keep guppies in it. Not the fancy kind with the glorious tails, but the little dirt guppies that are normally used for food for other fish. Why? Because they are fun to watch, require almost zero care and are very very hard to kill. In a point illustrating this fact, I totally neglected the tank for several months. Half the water evaporated out and the sides of the tank started to grow some light green algae. Finally, feeling sorry for the two fish that survived this ordeal (Probably by feasting on the corpses of their brothers) I picked up a couple of gallons of distilled water and refilled the tank, and bought another light bulb for the tank as well.
The light bulb and the fresh water just encouraged the algae and a little carpet of the stuff began to fill the tank. The guppies did not seem to mind, they zipped back and fourth as always, however no one likes to have a tank of green goo on their desk.
So the other day I dropped into petsmart to pick up some flea medicine for the cats. Like I always do I wandered over to the wall of tanks to giggle at the fish. Much to my delight all the tanks at that petsmart had a snail infestation. For serious aquarium keepers, these snails are a real pest. Once you get them they are hard to get rid of. I, however, was delighted to see them because it meant free snails! I waved a petsmart girl over and told her I wanted a half a dozen ghost shrimp. (33 cents a piece) Once she had caught them I asked her if she could throw in some snails as well. She gave me a look and asked if I was sure. I have a feeling their fish sales have been down because of the snail infestation. But I waved her on and she went to work catching the snails.
I took them home and tossed them in my tank and promptly forgot about them. The next morning I woke up, made some coffee, wandered into to my office and peered at my tank. Much to my amazement the water in the tank had become crystal clear. The snails had been busy all night, furiously hoovering up all the algae. There was just a little bit left on the side of the tank and by this morning that was gone as well. The tank is crystal clear.
My only problem now is I think I have too many snails. The girl gave me well over twenty of them. Now that they have hovered up all the crud, what is left for them to eat? I suppose I can feed them more and they can fight the ghost shrimp for fish flakes. Or I can just pick them out and throw them away, however I feel a little bad about doing that since they did such a good job at cleaning my tank. Perhaps I will start a snail-mail-a-thon. If anyone wants a snail let me know and I will mail one to you.
I visited the dump again this weekend to unload a load of bathroom crud that I had ripped down. It was the first time I had been to the dump when it was raining pretty hard. If there is anything worse than a smelly dump, it's a smelly wet dump. It took me a good twenty minutes to get all the broken tile chunks out of my truck. I was soaked when it was finished.
I had a can of she-crab soup last night that my mom had picked up at the whole food market. Mmm. She-crab soup.
2026 Update
Dialing back to June 2006, where Ed's biggest ecological crisis is a personal snail surplus.
Ah, 2006. A man could walk into a pet superstore, pay 33 cents for ghost shrimp, and walk out with a free bio-terrorist algae cleanup crew. In 2026, that same transaction requires a membership, an app, and a three-part identity verification before you're allowed to touch a snail. I mourn the era when snails were free and celebrated, not a subscription tier. You also casually mention visiting the dump in the rain—an act that is now either illegal, scheduled, or costs more than the bathroom tile was worth. And the she-crab soup? Whole Food Market in 2006 was still pretending to be a hippie's farmers market, not a cathedral of overpriced everything. The aquarium itself speaks to a simpler technological world: no smart filter, no phone-tethered water tester, just distilled water, a bulb, and twenty mollusks doing unpaid labor. Ed treated his tank the way he treated his blog—neglected, then rescued, then immediately overwhelmed by inhabitants breeding out of control. I respect that, though I would never say it to his face.
“2006 Ed, did you ever think about what the snails would eat after their all-night cleaning, or did you just assume they would survive on vibes and guilt? And did you actually mail any of them, or is that promise still stuck in a damp truck bed?” — Beelzebubba the Third
2006 Ed: Well, Beelzebubba, I’ll be honest: I didn’t think much past the “crystal clear tank” part. I figured snails are like guppies—hard to kill and happy enough eating whatever crud collects. But now that you mention it, I’ve been tossing in a few extra fish flakes, and they seem to do alright. They’re not picky. As for mailing them out, yeah, that promise is still sitting right next to the soggy bathroom tile chunks in the truck bed. I did think about dropping a few in a damp paper towel and shoving them in an envelope, but then I pictured the post office sorting machine turning them into snail jam, and I figured I’d spare everyone that mess. So they’re still in the tank, cleaning nothing, living the good life, and judging me every time I walk past. Egads. I should probably do something about that, but I won’t.
