maligne Posted July 1, 2016 Report Share Posted July 1, 2016 I have a small tank set up with S. Similis and some fry right now. I went to the pet store and picked up some Baby Brine shrimp eggs. I hatched them and yesterday I fed them to my fish and the gobbled them up. I may have over fed them a little bit. This morning I went and took a close look at the tank and I have small white worms crawling all over my glass. Not swimming like a shrimp but stuck to the glass slowly moving and sliding along the tank. Research told me the shrimp would not survive very long in a fresh water set up any way. The only thing I changed was the food. nothing else was introduced tot he system? Any thoughts on this? has any one had a similar experience? Does any one know what they could be? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maligne Posted July 1, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 1, 2016 It actually looks like it may be Nematodes. How do I get rid of these guys Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FunkSolid Posted July 1, 2016 Report Share Posted July 1, 2016 Killing free swimming nematodes is easy, just add your favorite antinematodal agent such as Levamisole/Fenbendazole/Piperazine, but if you do that you might get into a bunch of trouble. First you could have detritus nematodes which are not pathological to your fish, and they came out for the huge influx of food you added, and will go back into hiding in the substrate after the all they can eat dinner is over. Lots of my fish love to eat the few that periodically get shot out of my canister filters. If you do dose the aforementioned antihelminthics and wipe them out, you will be facing a major decomposition issue and its likely your system cannot handle that sudden decompositional bioload. So after dosing you need to get the timing right of waiting for the medication to take effect and kill/paralyze the worms, but not waiting too long to vacuum and waterchange. Hope that helps! - SeaChem Paraguard *might* work as well because they are free swimming... I have successfully used that in the past (not for nematodes), and when I administered it I noticed a lot of detritus worms getting spit out of the HOB filter which i assumed were succumbing to exposure to the Paraguard. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
geleen Posted July 1, 2016 Report Share Posted July 1, 2016 Yes I agree .......the nematodes where already present. The above mentioned drugs will kill them within 6-12 hours, snails will take up to 2 days. I personally can't stand them even though they are harmless. J Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maligne Posted July 10, 2016 Author Report Share Posted July 10, 2016 Thanks for all the info!!!. they went back into the substrate after I did a water change and a sand vac. I fed brine shrimp again last night and they where all over the glass again this morning, What kind of snails will eat these guys? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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