# [Wet Thumb Forum]-Aquatic Insects



## mome rath (Mar 17, 2004)

Has anyone tried to keep a community of aquatic insects?


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## mome rath (Mar 17, 2004)

Has anyone tried to keep a community of aquatic insects?


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## Paul Higashikawa (Mar 18, 2004)

I did that when I was still in college, while taking a course on aquatic entomology. Incidentally, I managed to bring back few alive ones and put them in my tank. Depends on what insect and what fish you have in your tank, you would have to be utmost careful about it.

If you only want to keep purely insect tank, with little or no fish then your option would be much greater. Whirlygig(emits a nice apple smell), waterboatman, water diving beetles, water scorpions, are merely few of the greater choices you could keep. All in all, beetles comprise the largest number of insects in our planet, and water is no exception. There are many cool looking water beetles, some I just mentioned. There is one very predacious water bug you should not try to mix in with your fish; it is called Belostomatidae--->Lethocerus. This bug(not a beetle) is ferocious and WILL eat fishes larger than its size. Maximum growth is around 3 inches. I(stupidly)put 3 into my tank, and 1 of which killed and ate my pleco that was 5 inches big. I think I've told this story before. Brings back sad memories><

You can also check out my professor's site:
http://www.esb.utexas.edu/jcabbott/courses/bio321web/index.html

Paul


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## The Bishop (Mar 11, 2004)

I had an experience with unwittingly keeping small, gray aphids. I was having a small algae attack in a 40 gallon tank, so I added a few pieces of water lettuce from the LFS. A couple of my Aponogetons happened to be flowering that week, and being a guy who's fairly partial to flowers, I left the lid up so they could bloom fully.

Into the fourth week of their bloomings, I started noticing that my colony of water lettuce was getting a little yellow. I chose to ignore it, thinking it a quirk resulting from me missing the previous week's water change. The next day the plants were even yellower, so I took a closer look. Some of the leaves had little tiny gray aphids on them. I flicked a couple off into the water and watched as they climbed right back up. Within a week, all of my lettuce was dying, so I started looking for a cure.

Google yieled very little on the keeping of aquatic insects aside from sporadic articles about sampling your local pond. I tried all kinds of searches, but got nothing else. I did find a short reference in that small red-bordered book (I think the title is Aquarium Plant Manual--aquabotanic lists it as the best beginner book for the aquatic gardening hobby).

I still hadn't put two and two together, so I started asking around. No one knew about or how to get rid of aphids in the aquarium, except a store north of here who had it on the floating leaves of _Vallisneria_ in one of their tanks. The guy there said he had just added a few zebra danios and not had fed them, since they hang pretty much below the surface and certainly enjoy live meals. A month later the bugs in that tank were gone. I suggested perhaps Hatchetfish, and I got half a dozen of the marbled ones to try it myself.

While I was busy flicking aphids to the Hatchetfish, I noticed that I had another kind of bug, no bigger than a flea, that bounced on the water. Searching the internet revealed that they were what is called Springtails. And the Hatchets were making short work of them.

I finally found out from a friend that the aphids were actually arachnids, and the best way to kill arachnids is to mold their lungs. I shut the lid immediately. A few weeks later all the bugs were gone. So, however, was my water lettuce.









I can imagine keeping aquatic insects in a setting like this, if one were so inclined.


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## mome rath (Mar 17, 2004)

Thanks for the replies.

SurWrathful: I probably should have mentioned that I'm a 4th year entomology major :> 
I've kept corixids and ptilids before, but I was really interested in hydrophilids, gyrinids, etc. The main problem I can think of is trying to keep different insect populations together in a tank without most of them becoming lunch for a few buggers.

Bishop: Yep, springtails... pretty much ubiquitous. Cute little buggers too :>


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## Paul Higashikawa (Mar 18, 2004)

Awesome! Then you should know your bugs well









I think it really depends on the size of your tank and how much debris/hiding places you have in there. IE.branches, fallen leaves, rocks, etc...

I guess at some point or another, some bugs will become foods for the others, if you plan on keeping more than one kind and more than one size.

I managed to keep predacious diving beetle and diving beetle together in a 20-gal, housed with many fishes. They all lived in good harmony; the beetles would actually eat the catfish sinking wafers I drop in. It would be kindda interesting to keep some really nice aquatic insects, particularly beetles. Are you planning on keeping a bug tank? Please show us the pictures if you do!

BTW, I pretty much forgot about all the scientific names until you mentioned them, hehe Let's see; there were ephimeroptera, lepidoptera, hemiptera, collioptera...the list goes on and on









Paul


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## Wally (Aug 31, 2003)

I kept a large dragon fly nymph for a long time, one day when I got home from work there was a large dragon fly flying around the house and a very angry wife meeting me at the door


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## Robert Hudson (Feb 5, 2004)

Rhonda Wilson has some experience with this.

I have flatworms and Scuds in my tanks....

Dragon fly and Damsel fly larva are common, but will eat fish fry.

Here is Rhondas WEB site

http://naturalaquariums.com/


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## feefeefish (Apr 5, 2004)

I kept daphnia magna in my tank, but in a breeder net to keep them safe while they cleaned up my pea-soup green water. I then released them and they were promptly eaten!









Daphnia can grow easily and cheaply in a bucket of stagnant gree water...if you like having buckets of stagnant green water hanging around!


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## sb483 (May 29, 2006)

I wanted to find out what these insects were on top of my water lettuce and I found this thread. Here's a photo of aphids (I think) sitting on a water lettuce leaf:


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## Miss Fishy (May 13, 2006)

Are the aphids eating your water lettuce? Sometimes large colonies of aphids attack my emergent plants but they always seem to leave after a while. Sometimes they eat all the leaves off the milfoils, just leaving a bare stalk! I used to feed them to the fish but I can't be bothered anymore since they never actually kill any of my plants. The are are quite cute too. 

Talking of insects, one of my tanks has about 10 mayfly larvae living in it. I'm not sure what I'll do when they hatch and start flying around the house! 

From Alex.


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## sb483 (May 29, 2006)

Miss Fishy said:


> Talking of insects, one of my tanks has about 10 mayfly larvae living in it. I'm not sure what I'll do when they hatch and start flying around the house!
> 
> From Alex.


I saw a dragonfly - newly born and completely green - sitting motionless on top of the tank light. I wrapped it in tissue (it never moved) and threw the whole thing outside. The next morning, it was there again, back on the tank light. Not the same one, but (I'm pretty sure) another fresh dragonfly. I did the same thing.
This happened for the next 3 mornings. Since I've never seen dragonflies about the house afterwards, I assume that was all. They did a good job hiding in the tank; I only saw them when one crawled out of the water.


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## flagg (Nov 29, 2004)

Certainly look like aphids! At least the light green ones do, so I would imagine they all are. Best cure for aphids is ladybugs, but unless these are in an outdoor pond that might not be such a practical solution.

-ricardo


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## snowy (Jun 6, 2006)

I have fond memories of visiting a friend's property in the bush when I was a youngster and collecting all sorts of water bugs and so forth out of the creek and dams. We'd keep them in small tanks and bottles for the week and watch them interact and sometimes even eat each other! Often we'd catch larva close to moulting and it would be fascinating to watch them crawl up some reeds and become dragonflies or mayflies.

I just ordered this book to inspire me to get down to the local creek / stormwater course and see what I can find. http://www.publish.csiro.au/nid/18/pid/3148.htm


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## Miss Fishy (May 13, 2006)

That looks like a great book! I looked at the sample pages, and now I'm going to get a magnifying glass and see if I can determine which species the mayfly nymphs in my tank are. 

From Alex.


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