Name: Ốc Sula Cam - Orange Poso Snail - Tép Sulawesi
Brand: Jack Shrimp

Sulawesi Snail · Lake Poso

Tylomelania sp. "Orange" (Poso)

Orange Poso Rabbit Snail

A solid orange body — head, foot and tentacles all the same colour — against a long dark brown-black spire. This is a form recorded from Lake Poso but never described as a species, and both of the Latin names the trade pastes onto it are wrong.

Solid orange bodyLake PosoNot identified to species

A rabbit snail is not a cleaning crew — it's a collector's animal, and it has to be kept like one.

— Jack Shrimp Farm

ORIGIN

Lake Poso — and two misapplied Latin names

This animal corresponds to the form the Sulawesi Keepers project catalogues as 'Poso 1 – Orange', which is explicitly undescribed. The trade attaches two Latin names to it and both are wrong. 'Tylomelania zemis' is not a valid name at all: it is a corruption of T. zeamais, a Lake Matano endemic. 'T. gemmifera' is likewise a Lake Matano endemic. Poso and Matano lie some 400 km apart, are entirely separate radiations and share no species — so neither name can belong to a Poso snail.

DISTRIBUTION MAP

An ancient cradle

Sulawesi shrimp are endemic to a handful of ancient tectonic lakes — 1–4 million years old, among the oldest freshwater lakes on earth.

Lake MatanoHome of Cardinal & White Sock (C. dennerli)

Lake PosoHome of White Orchid, Blue Legs (C. “Poso”)

Towuti · MahalonaThe Malili lake system, linked by rivers

IDENTIFICATION

Identifying the Orange Poso

🟠Solid orange, no patternHead, foot and tentacles are one saturated orange, with no spots or streaks. It is the easiest rabbit snail to recognise of anything on the Vietnamese market.

🐚Long spire, eroded apexDark brown to black, elongate and sharply spired, with the apex usually worn back to a pale stump. On a wild-caught adult that erosion is entirely normal.

📏Realistically 4–7 cmListings often claim 5–8 cm. On actual imported stock the honest figure is around 4–7 cm measured with the animal fully extended out of the shell.

❌Ignore the name 'zemis'A shop printing Tylomelania zemis is telling you it copied without checking: that name does not exist anywhere in zoological nomenclature.

WATER

Ideal keeping conditions

26–30°

Temp C

7.5–8.5

100–200

TDS ppm

6–12

3–8

The Sulawesi lakes are hot and alkaline but genuinely SOFT — Matano measures 28.7°C, pH 8.5, GH 7, KH 5 and around 87 ppm TDS. So do not chase a very high GH: a stable alkaline pH and enough KH to buffer it are what matter. Stability still beats perfect numbers.

SHELL

KH is what keeps the shell intact. An eroded apex is completely normal on a wild-caught adult — the warning sign is fresh erosion or pitting at the NEW growth near the aperture, which means KH and minerals in the tank are dropping.

SPECIES DATA

Orange Poso data sheet

Species data

Scientific name: Tylomelania sp. "Orange" (Poso)
Identification confidence: Not identified to species
Origin: Lake Poso, Central Sulawesi
Names wrongly applied: "T. zemis", T. gemmifera
Adult size: 4–7cm
Preferred substrate: Fine sand with grazing rock

Wild species — natural profile

Lake Poso is its own radiation, quite separate from the Malili system: four described species and around ten more forms that still have no name. This orange snail belongs to the unnamed group.

Origin: Lake Poso in Central Sulawesi, together with the Poso river system. It is an ancient lake roughly 400 km from the Malili lakes and shares no species with them.

Natural habitat: The Poso bed mixes sand, gravel and submerged rock. Rabbit snails split into hard-substrate and soft-substrate specialists, so a tank should offer both kinds of surface.

Behaviour & diet: It grazes biofilm, attached algae and detritus. It feeds slowly and clears no nuisance algae whatsoever, so supplementary feeding is compulsory rather than optional.

Conservation: All trade stock is wild-caught. Lake Poso is under pressure from agricultural pollution, introduced fish and collection, which makes growing these on and breeding them worthwhile.

Keeping note: No reliable open Poso water chemistry has been published, so keep it on the general Sulawesi targets: warm, alkaline pH, a stable KH and a genuinely low TDS.

BREEDING & SHELL

Why rabbit snails stay rare

🍼Live-bearing, not egg-layingMales and females are separate animals; the female broods in a uterine pouch and releases one fully-shelled crawl-away juvenile.

1️⃣One baby at a timeAbout one juvenile per female every 4–6 weeks (broods hold 1–7). This is exactly why rabbit snails stay rare and expensive.

🐢Very slow growthRoughly a year and about 4 cm to reach maturity. Lifespan 1–3 years, with records up to 5.

🐚Shell & mineralsHold KH 3–8 and feed enough calcium. An eroded apex is normal; erosion on new shell growth is the alarm.

HYBRIDISATION

Different Tylomelania species DO hybridise in aquaria. If you want to keep a line pure for breeding, keep one species per tank. Mixed-species tanks are for display only.

FOOD & SET-UP

The matching set-up

COMMON MISTAKE

Rabbit snails are NOT an algae crew. They graze biofilm and detritus, they will not clear a nuisance-algae problem, and they must be fed. Keeping them 'to clean the tank' is the single most common reason they quietly starve over a few months.

FEEDING

Omnivorous, mostly biofilm, detritus and blanched vegetables. Add White Powder + Yellow Powder 2–3 times a week, plus blanched pumpkin or cucumber for growth. A Sula Sand substrate holds the alkaline pH long-term and gives the soft-sediment species somewhere to plough for detritus.