The white worms are really starting to make me angry

Ok, remember those white worms in my tank that I posted about? Well, They seemed harmless enough, at first irritating my wild Type Axolotl by clinging to him and making him itch. He is very light colored with lots of spots, but on Grimace, I can see lots of the little things crawling on him! He's very itchy, my wild type seems itchy sometimes, but I think he's used to it so it doesn't bother him. Those little things really bother Grimace and he will smash himself into the glass and rocks trying to rid himself of them. I don't know what to do. As many of you have said they are harmless, but how can I keep them from making my axies itch? All day he just swims around trying to get rid of the darn things. If anyone can help. Please let me know. Thanks

Rheann - Are they the worms that are crawling on him or another type of "bug"?

Can you take a picture of them?

from: http://www.indiana.edu/~axolotl/axolotls/faq2.html

The Richard Gordan lab (University of Manitoba) offers the following: We've had great luck treating skin infections and skin parasites, "fuzz" on the gills and apparent fungus in nip wounds, and red sores or skin irritations with Nitrofura - G, a compound of Furazolidine, methylene blue, and postassium dichromate available from most fish stores. We use it in the dosage recommended by the manufacturer. It goes in the water as a yellow powder that turns the water blue. The animals usually improve rather dramatically over three doses.

Might those "worms" be young leeches? How do they "crawl". There are very small leeches that can hide in aquatic plants. They vary in color from near translucent off white to a brownish black.

Do they swim like these:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/science/media/nm_leeches.jpg

I don't know if a salt bath would be worth a try..

Hi Cynthia, Hi Ester I can't get a picture of them, I don't know if they are bugs, or what they are. I have tried finding pictures that look like them over the internet, and I have, but i am not sure if they are the same thing. They are so small, you can hardly see them. Some are bigger than others, they are all under mm long or 2 or 3mm, but mostly only a mm long. Some look like little white rice, some look like little white worms. It's driving me crazy! They are really irritating my axolotls making them itch, I can't pin point where they came from, I thought maybe they had come from the tanks at the Aquarium I got my frirst one, then I started supsecting the earthworms I fed, now I don't know what to think. they are completly aquatic, they won't come out of the water. They also float around in the water and will attach them selves to the glass, plants and anything they can hold onto. I sat there and watched them crawl on my black Axolotl, with him you can see the buggers as plain as day. He is so itchy. I am worried ifmaybe they go inside him too from his skin, but I don't know, I can't tell they are so small. I will look to see if I can find pictures. Any advise what do to? I can't identify them, as there are too many different pictures and discriptions that sound so much like them. I have tried looking at them with my microscope, but it's hard to tell what they are exactly. They sort of move in a forward motion, pushing the back of their body forward and moving the front part. They will also swim up the glass in an S motion as well. Any idea what these could be? I need to get rid of them, they really are a problem.

Before you can get rid of them you have to know what they are.

I have never seen any kind of aquarium cootie on my axolotls.

I have seen the small white worms on the glass and in my frog tank I have seen small white round mite looking bugs that could move fairly fast. They all went away on their own (at least enough that I no longer notice them).

I would like to figure out what kind of creature is actually on your axolotl. Keep microscoping and searching the web for a picture.

I can't seem to find anything about what the things are in my tank. They can't be earthworm Nematodes because I don't think they would survive so long under water. They seem to have big heads are clear and white and their bodies are divided up into segments. They look very similiar to nematodes, but also look a little like tubafix worms, but they stay small. They attach them selves to the glass, there seems to be some of the Hydra in the tank, it's very small I have no idea where that came from but I'm not worried about it and it's been in the tank for weeks. The worms will also float around in the water and will attach them selves to my Axolotls. My Axolotls will bash them selves into the rocks and glass trying to get the worms off and will scratch at their gills. My wild type who has been in the tank for a long time seemed to be bothered by them at first, and he is still bothered by them once in a while, but because Grimace is so black I can see the things crawling on him, they crawl over him and make him itch, and I am not sure if they are going inside his skin, I can't tell. I will continue to look for pictures until I can find something similiar or exactly what I am looking for, and for now the tank will remain as it is. Thanks for your help

Rheann, check this out

http://www.fishdoc.co.uk/disease/flukes.htm

Ok, I think I figured out what is in the tank. I think they are microworms. Here is a link. http://members.aol.com/larval1/micro.htm They pose no threat to my Axolotls, but they do make them itch because they attatch them selves to them just trying to hang on. I could be wrong about this though, as they don't really look like micrworms, but the discription in the link almost fits it to a T. Can Microworms survive underwater? I can't seem to find anything about this. Capital Aquarium used pre-cycled water to give to the Axolotls, and perhaps this is where they came from, I don't know for sure. Can anyone help me further on this? If they don't pose a threat, than they just itch and I really would like to get rid of them. They're sort of taking over my tank as my Otocinclus don't seem to really favor eating them anymore. At first they would eat them, now they ignore them and eat the green beans, cucumbers and Dracaena so they are somewhat taking over the tank again and causing discomfort, so if there is a safe way to get rid of them, I need to. I can't stand to watch my Axolotls get so irritated by them.

I used microworms to feed my baby axies. From your description you do not have microworms. Microworms are nearly invisible they are so small, as for being able to see a head, it wouldn't be possible. When I put them into the water, they used to just disperse on the floor, not climbing the glass or onto the axies. As far as attaching themselves to axies, I dont think this would be possible as they don't have the equipment. Have you checked out the link from my last post because i think its a definite possibility and will need to be treated ASAP if it is.

I found this also (good site) Its a movie of a critter in action - is your microscope handy?
http://www.fishdoc.co.uk/video/gyrodactylus 01.mpg


(Message edited by waltona on June 22, 2005)

Hi Anne Those don't look like the things that are in my tank, but what are those things you posted about? There is a possibility some might be that, how would I treat the problem? What medication would I use, or would i have to strip my tank apart? I am going to go get my microscope and see if I can take another look at the creeps. Are the things you posted about going to kill my Axolotl in the long run or infest them? Thanks so much for your help!

You say the white worms are at most 3mm long. You also say some look like rice and others look like worms.. Do you mean that when they sit still they look like rice, but when they move they stretch themselves out, and then look more like worms?
Are they attached with their whole body to the glass/plant/axie.. or do they attach the rear end of their body to an object?


As for a source, did you recently add fresh aquatic plants? Since they are so small, it might be that you only got one pregnant leech in the tank who then had 20 or so little ones.. Even an adult leech of this kind wouldn't be more than half a cm in the "rice" state.

I can't find a picture of the ones I mean either, if you search the internet for leeches they all show these big ones. When I come across one in the near future I'll try taking pictures of them myself.

The things I posted about - do you mean the microworms? These are literally microscopic - they look like tiny hairs buzzing around. They do climb up the sides of the container, but they exist on a yeast/oats/water mixture so I'm not sure how they could survive in an aquarium for so long? As far as I'm aware they're perfectly harmless but I can't see them attaching themselves to axolotls. As per previous post, I used microworms to feed to my baby axies when they were only a few weeks old, so they must be pretty harmless.

As Ester states, the "rice" stage you mention does not apply at all to microworms. Do you have snails in the tank - after reading up on those spooky flukes, it says the snail is usually the primary host. It certainly sounds like some sort of aquatic parasite - the fact that they attach to the axies indicate this to me. Maybe Joan can help - I believe she is an entomologist?

Thanks for your help Ester I don't know for sure yet what they are. It would seem that when they aren't stretched out, they look like rice, but they could be two different things, or maybe the same things. They keep their bodis fixed to the glass, and then from what I have seen, will lift part of their body off the glass, but when they do this they some times drift into the water current. Right now they don't seem to be buggin my Axolotls. it woud seem they bother them when the substrate gets disturbed, or when they get blown about and happen to land on the Axolotls. I really hope to get to the bottom of this soon! I'll do an internet search on leeches and see if by chance they look what I am seeing. they move in a pattern like this, the arrows meaning they move themselves forward, stretching their heads out. >----->------>--->
They're creepy! I don't have a digital camera, or a good camera that can get fine close ups. all I have right now is a ditital camera that really isn't much help as close ups are concerned, and when I get the film developed I will get it on a cd because there are pics of my Axies on it and I don't have a scanner either. I hope to get a digi cam soon though or a scanner Please any further help would be most appreciated from anyone. Thanks

These might be what I have! Here is a link.
http://www.watersheds.org/nature/gallery2/pages/leeches.htm
Notice the big heads the baby leeches have, they look like the ones in my tank, except I have no idea how small baby leeches are, so i am not sure if these are the right thing, but if they are, they are sucking the blood of my Axies. What can i do to get rid of them? Ok, I may know how these things got in my tank, and I didn't think about it until now, but it could be a possibility. I had a mudpuppy for a short while. I got him from a pet shop where they kept him in a tank with gold fish and fire bellied toads. I took him home, he was very thin and sick. I didn't even have him that long and he died. He never ate, or ate very little that I can remember. I did my best to help him, but I know that I could have done more for him if I only knew what to do for him. After he died I cleaned the tank out as best as I could, there was gravel in the tank and i removed it and replaced it with sifted washed sand. that was a 10 gallon tank I was using and i cycled it and put my first axolotl in it. I soon got a 20 gallon tank and put some sand in the tank that was from the 10 gallon. I washed it off, washed off all the plants and orniments, then put them in the 20 gallon. Maybe the leeches came from the mudpuppy because he was caught from the wild and it made me sad so this is why i brought him home in the first place. I am going to keep looking for pictures. I think my quest is starting to narrow down. Thanks Ester, I never would have thought to even concider leeches I am really wondering if they are.

They also might be
Oligochaeta. Does anyone know what these are exactly? Some sort of worm that is all I know. Either they are leeches, or these things, so I have narrowed it down to these for the moment unless something else comes into play. Are Oligochaeta dangerous? I think I'm more concerned about them being leeches. How do I get rid of these things? Leeches, Oligochaeta?

http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/optics/olympusmicd/galleries/moviegallery/pondscum/annelida/aquaticearthworm/
this is also a possibility.

If you have a web cam, those can usually do amazingly good closeup pictures if you fiddle around with them a little.

This is the leech I was looking for:
Helobdella stagnalis
here a few links, but if you do a picture search on that latin name there are more to be found.

http://www.microcosmos.org/pics/helobdella01.jpg
http://www.xerces.org/aquatic/Columbia_Slough/Helobdella_stagnalis_dor_ven_ruler_450.jpg
http://people.freenet.de/Egelgalerie/Image11.gif

This is a pretty common occurance in tanks that contain a high organic load in the water (often from overfeeding/inadequate siphoning of material from the bottom of the tank) and are a free living flatworm (not a leech but related) and in high levels can irritate fish and aquatic animals by crawling around on their bodies.
Increasing water changes and making sure all uneaten food is removed right away will decrease these guys.

Ed

Thanks so much Ester, Thanks so much, Edward I think you solved my problem, Edward. I have been doing a 20% water change every week, but I do have some Otocinclus in the tank, they are small and are thriving, but I noticed since I put my Dracaena (lucky bamboo) Into the water. it is thriving, so I am guessing it helped with an explosion of those darn worms. Funny thing too, I had a nightmare about those darn worms because I've been so focused on them! I drept they completly took over the tank and my Axies were poking their heads around trying to find an opening so they could look out at me. It was scary. Anyway, I'll also get one of those tank scrubbers and scrub them away. Question though, are these flatworm things parasitic? Should I get some de-worming medication for my Axolotls and if I need to, which kind? Thanks so much for your help