small white worm

i found a few small white worms in my tank the other day,i'v never seen them before it was just after i had changed the cotton wool from the filter i dont know if it came there.should i be worried?

 

I had the same stuff in my tank, all I did was add Guppies and they ate it all up.. and they are still 100% fine.

 

Lol only if the guppies can out run the oscars long enough

 

Hi Oscar

I have the same in my tank, I read somwhere that these small white worms are caused from having uneaten food from your fish (assuming you have oscars, with oscars being messy eaters). Do not worry about these.

 

Put in a Pleco they should also sort out the problem

 

lekka iv got 2 in there already so i should be sorted,also a very greedy giraffe cichlid who looooves worms

thanx pete,ja these oscars tend to be very messy i was looking for a fish or fishes smaller in size to be the clean up crew the malawi helps but maybe i need something else,any ideas?

 

Its called 'Plantaria' i think. They say that its from overfeeding and that though they are harmless, it does indicate underlying problems. Someone told me that it can mean a 'bacteria spike' is on the way and suggests doing a good gravel clean and some consecutive water changes.

 

thanx u saving my life will get on it asap though its hard to do a gravel clean cause i got riversand so nothing gets trapped anywhere it sits on top till i suck it out or the pump gets it.i will go easy on the feeding for a while

 

Like Marco said doing a good gravel clean will to the job, unfortunately I had fine sand so gravel cleaning was not a option. If you also have this another thing that you could try is to not feed your fish for two days which will cause these things to starve and die.

 

be very carefull your riversand hasnt gone anaerobic , if the sand has compacted to much and no O2 has gotten in it could be your underlying problem

 

ok i hear u.when i do my weekly water changes i fill up with the hosepipe and it stirs up quite a bit of the substrate and mind you so do my oscars when they get the urge to flex their muscles

maybe i must get one of those nitrate kits to,any ideas on that?

 

u can most of them are not accurate and are expencive. I use the tetra strips for an indication. What i also do is cut the strips in half so i can get twice as many tests out of it

 

ok then thats not gonna be of any help to me what i will do is cut down feeding to every 2nd day,increase to maybe 25 30% water change

 

oscars are really really messy fish so good filtration is needed and i found a power-head or 2 will help to keep the tank clean

 

just a thought, if i'm not mistaken, it is very important to do gravel cleaning with fine sand. If the bottom is 'unmoved' for too long it sort of goes stale. Just because we think heavy matter cannot penetrate, the crevaces are still big enough for tiny particles to get bogged down in there.

 

And if i might add Reafer, feeding every 2 days is not nescessarily going to solve your problem. I feed my fish 5 sometimes 8 times a day. What might be the problem is the amount of food you give with each serving.

 

do you not have a propper test kit ? .
what are you feeding your oscars mabe try hikari gold .i found it does not mess as much as other foods and you can feed much less of it.
you will have to work on your water quailty before the aro gets put in there.

 

Ja thats why i want to sort it out asap.i feed tetradomin cichlid sticks,earthworms,red meat and crickets mainly and have just started adding frozen bloodworms.they eat quite a bit and dont waste its the stuff that comes out the gills thats the problem i think