# small white things?



## Cassie (May 27, 2006)

In my RCS tank, I have noticed that there are very small, maybe 1-2 mm, white/opaque creatures. They are on the tank walls, in the moss, and in a patch of hair algae mostly. Their movement is very shrimp like, so my first inclination was that they were baby cherries, however, there are TONS of them, so I'm having second thoughts. Under a magnifying glass I couldn't tell. Their body shape looks oval-ish. Any ideas as to what they are? Could they really be cherries, or are they something else? If they are something else, are they harmful? How would I go about getting rid of them?


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## joephys (May 9, 2006)

Sounds like palinaria. Do they look like they have horns?


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## Cassie (May 27, 2006)

not really... it appears as if they may have antenna, but they don't look like horns. I did a google search for "palinaria" but it didn't yield anything. What exactly are they?


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## John P. (Nov 24, 2004)

I think he meant to type "planaria."


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## Purrbox (Jun 1, 2006)

Sounds more like Copepods to me. If this is the case they are harmless.


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## Cassie (May 27, 2006)

I don't think they are planaria, they don't move like worms, they float around and "swim" and "walk" like my cherries do. 

Here's what I found about copeods from wikipedia...
"Copepods are typically 1-2 mm long, with a teardrop shaped body and large antennae. Although like other crustaceans they have an armoured exoskeleton, they are so small that in most species this armour, and the entire body, is almost totally transparent. Copepods have a single eye, usually bright red and in the centre of the transparent head."

That matches pretty well, however the ones in my tank do not have large antenna or the red eye.


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## eklikewhoa (Jul 24, 2006)

i noticed them too in my RCS tank while i was checking on the little shrimplets. anyone know where or what causes them?


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## YuccaPatrol (Mar 26, 2006)

Sounds like copepods to me too. If you have them, it is a sign that you have high quality water. When I don't see copepods, I know that I am late for a water change.


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## frugalfish (Apr 20, 2005)

Ditto with YuccaPatrol. Only problem I have had with any of the small organisms like those are when they overpopulate and begin snacking on my mosses.


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## tropism (Jul 21, 2006)

I had some white things crawling on my glass a while back too. They were so small (under 1 mm) that I could *barely* count 8 legs using a magnifying glass, but I wasn't sure. I got one under a microscope and could tell that they were definitely not copepods. I figure they had to be in the mite family, but they didn't look anything like any aquatic mite pictures I could find... the closest things I could find were terrestrial ticks.

They did have 8 legs, each one with 6 (I think) segments and a set of pinchers on the end. When the pinchers where turned you could tell that they were hook shaped. Here's a sketch that I drew while I was looking at them under the 'scope. I didn't draw out the details on all of the legs. (sorry for the quality)









Cassie: Are they out on the glass during the whole day, or do they start crawling back to the bottom of the tank shortly after you turn the lights on? Are you able to get a good enough look at them to count their legs (or see if they even have any) or tell if they look like pictures of copepods on the net?


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## Cassie (May 27, 2006)

tropism said:


> Cassie: Are they out on the glass during the whole day, or do they start crawling back to the bottom of the tank shortly after you turn the lights on? Are you able to get a good enough look at them to count their legs (or see if they even have any) or tell if they look like pictures of copepods on the net?


They are on the glass the entire day, as well as some on the plants and mosses. I was not able to get a really good look at them, I think my mag glass is only a x2 or x3 with a x5 small area, and the fact that they are partly translucent doesn't help, but they did not appear to have legs. If they are copepods, is there any danger in having them there in the tank? Is there a way to get rid of them?


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## tropism (Jul 21, 2006)

They probably are copepods, and I don't think there's any danger. If they're amphipods instead, they may overpopulate and eat your plants, but that's the only danger with those -- none to your shrimp as far as I know. You might want to check out this thread about amphipods. (they were first mistakenly IDed as copepods...)

Either one of those can be fed to fish, but I'm not sure how to totally get rid of them. Seriously, I wouldn't worry about it unless you see obvious problems with your plants.

I don't think they're the little mites (or whatever) I had. They did not like the light and within 30 minutes of turning the lights on, they had crawled back out of sight. I have absolutely no clue if those were harmful or not... They just happened to show up right before I nuked my tank (for other reasons) so they weren't around long.


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## Cassie (May 27, 2006)

they don't look like the amphipods in the pictures on that thread. those ones look more like worms and are much larger and more elongated than what's in my tank. I guess I'll use a turkey baster to suck them up and feed them to my other fish. I might as well make use of them...


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## Cassie (May 27, 2006)

ok, I just saw three planaria in my tank, for sure that's what they were. I still have the small white things that look and move very differently...


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## Cassie (May 27, 2006)

So I did a little bit of searching, and I think that they might be seed shrimp. I found  this  topic and the picture is very similar, as is the description I found on google... apparently they aren't harmful, but also aren't appealing as fish food. I'll just try to do water changes 2-3 times a week to see if that gets rid of them, or at least decreases their number so I don't notice them!


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## Gregor Samsa Mendel (May 29, 2006)

Cassie: here is a movie of seed shrimp, aka ostracods:

http://www.gre.ac.uk/schools/nri/earth/ostracod/mpegs/Ostracods.mpg

Personally, I think they are cute little things and consider them more like pets than pests. I'm just happy that the critters in my tanks are alive, not dying or dead!


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## Cassie (May 27, 2006)

yeah, that flittering around one is exactly what's in my tank! good to know they aren't anything harmful. I did a water change and their number has significantly dropped, but there are still a few in there, and now maybe I won't attempt to completely eradicate them!


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## nevada (Apr 3, 2005)

i have no idea what it is but i did experience them before. To get rid of it is by intruducing fish to the tank. Fish that don't attack shrimp like the Boraras Family. i dun think it is harmfull for the shrimp unlike the other white thing that looks like leeches or worm ... that is very harmfull for shrimp, they will eventually stick to the shrimp and suck out the blood till theres no more blood ...

Edwin


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## vollman1 (Jul 25, 2006)

Edwin- I have seen some white wormlike creatures in some Christmas Moss that I received recently. I want to be sure that they are not what you are describing: do you have a pic or link to a pic of the critter you are describing? Or a name?


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## Cassie (May 27, 2006)

yeah, they are totally gone now...I moved my 5 b. matuclatas over to use their tank for a quick qt and ended up solving the seed shrimp problem as well!


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## HeyPK (Jan 23, 2004)

If they are shaped like little bean seeds and swim, they would be ostracods. The picture that Tropism drew is of an aquatic mite that I have seen, also. They move very slowly and do not swim. As far as I know, they are harmless, but I do wonder sometimes what they eat.


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