Siamese Fighter Killed By Tiny Floating White Worms

I had a Siamese fighter (The Boss) who was killed by little tiny floating white worms,
they were every where i had to take him out of the tank & clean out the whole tank
a few times (Which messed with my cycle)
but within hours they were all back again & he was choking on them. I tried everything (This pic is only an example)
i tried to identify the parasite & tried every possible medication/heat/salt relating to the identification
but nothing worked, a few weeks later he passed away & to this day it still haunts me that i couldnt
help him.

Does anyone know what this parasite was & how to cure it?

 

Mmmm thats weird, tell us more about the worms, where they swimming or attached to something? Did the betta eat them or did they attack him?

 

They where free floating & squirming around on the glass & on him, in his gills, in his mouth everywhere every time
he went to the surface for air being a labyrinth was breathing/suching them in, he kept trying to spit them out.
It was one of my worst nightmares come true! Sniff!!!

 

Oh I'm so sorry, that sounds so sad. I think they are planaria or flatworms, and they aren't supposed to be harmful to fish. I guess there were just too many for your guy to cope with. The usual way of dealing with them is to feed less, as they live on uneaten fish food and other tank waste. Since you cleaned out the whole tank several times I'd say you had a very resilient colony. What I'd suggest if this were ever to happen again, would be to introduce a number of tiny but voracious fish. I'm pretty sure a colony of endlers would do the trick, or something like Dario dario or sparkling gouramis. Your Betta may have been a bit too big to see them as a food source, or else there were just so many he couldn't eat them all himself.

 

Thanks PsyXe, Thanks for the info if i get another Betta i'll definitely be adding a few endlers with him.