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planaria


Aiko

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so I think I have planaria I have little white worm things on my glass, so I have a few questions if I get Fish Bendazole I have read that I should remove my assassin and apple snails they question is for how long?

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Aiko, I would suggest that if possible taking a picture for us. We want to be sure its planaria before dosing and not something like detritus worms, that are actually beneficial. If in fact it is planaria, and there bothersome to you, I have used No-Planaria in the past by Genchem, though many brands have similar products. You will need to ensure you remove all snails prior to dosing.

 

Planaria is not harmful either, usually people just think their unsightly and want them remove based on that fact. Usually their presence could be because of overfeeding.

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I wasn't too bothered by my planaria until I saw a few horrible videos of them killing adult and baby shrimps. Ordered my No-Planaria the next day.

 

Planaria in my experience don't kill shrimp. They are a "clean-up" crew naturally, usually these videos don't show planaria attacking the shrimp. They simply show the "clean-up" crew doing their work, disposing and breaking down dead shrimp, among other things.

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I would have to respectfully disagree with planaria not killing shrimp.  Here's why:

 

Several years back when I was developing my Nessie strain there was mixed ideas on planaria and if tehy were harmful.

 

Sure enough, I must have got some from some plants, because only one of my tanks suddenly had them.  As teh jury was still out, I did nothing.  Imagine my horror within a week when I noticed this:

 

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One of my prize Nessies, struggling and being eaten alive by planaria.  :growl: So I dosed with fenben and got rid of them.

 

Shortly thereafter retardo posted this on Shrimpnow:

"If I had not seen it for myself, I would not have believed it!! I saw this cherry shrimp in one of my friend's tanks completely taken over by planaria and immobilized! This shrimp was egg-laden and still clinging to life...
Seeing this was extremely frightening and I would recommend getting rid of any and all planaria in your tanks! I had believed that only weak or young shrimp would be able to be caught by planaria, but I watched as another healthy shrimp was attacked and overcome by planaria. Get fish that eat planaria or do as imke_j recommends and treat with flubendazole."

 

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You are obviously welcome to do as you wish, however this and my experience has made up my mind not to have them in my tank.

 

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Wow! Thank you for the information Bryce. I haven't had planaria but once in my beginning stages of keeping shrimp. I do keep my bag of No-Planaria for the just in case.

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I only learned though experience Deta, and like I said- back then the jury was still out on if they did or didn't cause harm. 

 

Glad you've not had to go through this. :)

 

---

 

Nematodes are white worms on the glass, detritus worms tend to squiggle through the water and live in the substrate.  Neither is harmful.

 

Planaria are shaped like arrows with little tiny crossed eyes.

 

Some people use no planaria, some use fenben like me.   I would remove any snails that you want to keep.  Ramshorns don't seem to be affected.  Some say it stays in the soil for awhile, so if when you plan to put the snails back in- use a test subject first.

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but yes so I was thinking on getting rid of them the are nasty looking and have been reading a lot of bad stuff about them , but I need to know how long to keep my snails in another tank for if I dose with Fish Bendazole stuff and yes being as this tank is my first set of shrimp I started off feeding them WAY too much I had no idea how little they eat I kept adding full sticks of food in no I cut them into very little pieces I also added an apple sanil to help make sure food doesn't get left over and got to say I love it its so cute going to get another, I did have a snail problem with pond snails from my LFS so I have assassin but I don't want my assassins. and apple snail

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Fair warning it could take a while before it's safe to put the snails back in. I have one tank that I have lost 7 nerites and one mystery snail in (they died). I have been trying to figure out why... then I remembered that I did dose it with no planaria way back in late November. I can't swear that's the reason for snail loss, but I have yet to come up with ANY other explanation. 

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I have those. I am pretty sure those are not planaria. I did treat my tank, as I just was not sure and there were so many.

IIRC, NoPlanaria did not kill them. 

Never seen them eating a shrimp. Still don't like to look at them, but what can you do? (I do not overfeed)

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update might just be detritus worms I did a good dig down into my gravel lots of yuck and muck so more than likely from when I was over feeding as I said my first set of shrimp so I'm learning its better now and I have a feeder dish to contain stuff now so hopefull I can clean some of the undergravel up and get them worms off my glass as with less food for them to eat and what not

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