Insects in my daphnia

[frank]

I just found an insect in my (shop bought) live daphnia. It is really fast, is shaped like white fly, like a long triangle, and is black and white. Does anyone know what this is?
Will it do anything bad to my baby axolotls?
I've tried to get rid of it, but it swims too fast for me to get!

 

[colin]

it sounds a bit like a waterboatman also called a backswimmer... have a google search and see if that fits the description???

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=water+boatman

Depending on how big the axolotl is i would remove it...

 

[frank]

I looked at those sites, and thats not really what it looks like, it is more fly-like, with white wings and is definately triangular, whereas the water boatman seemed more rounded. I think I managed to get rid of it, but I have seen them before in the daphnia....

 

[frank]

I just found some more of those insects, they kind of have blueish dark bits at the end of their wings.... any ideas?

 

[frank]

I just found another creature in my daphnia, it looks snail like, with a really long neck (but no actual shell, just the shape resembles a snail) and two little antennae. Its smaller than the daphnia and swims by twirling around... should I worry about it? In fact should I worry about any insects I find in with my daphnia?

 

[peter]

If you can get a photo, or even a detailed drawing, we might be able to tell you more, Frank.

 

[benjamin]

Sounds like your twirling, shell less, antenaed "snail" is not really a snail at all, sounds a little bit like a mousquito pupae. These would be absolutely fine for a caudate but I won't jump to any conclusions with out a picture or drawing.

(Message edited by ben_tajer on November 23, 2004)