Miniscule White Creatures

[carrera]

to my dismay, i just noticed tiny tiny white creatures in my betta tank. they are on the surface of the water, lots of them, and some on the heater, but none on the fish themselves. is this the beginning of ich?

 

[guppler]

maybe some kind of worm?

 

[carrera]

maybe some kind of worm?

they look more insect-like.

 

[BBrain]

I don't think Ick is visible, until it grows enough to see, on a fish's skin.

Maybe those are planaria.

 

[Phoenixfish]

or some sort of pond lavee? like mosquetos etc

 

[BigIan]

personally id do my best to remove them all , and see if the fish sows any signh of distress, if so then i would treat with some form of paracite medication such as malchite green (sp?)

 

[carrera]

hmm not much changed overnight, fish still seem fine. they look just like ich, same size and shape, except they are moving around and still not on any fish.

 

[Majjie]

Are they sort of jumping about on the surface?

If so, they're probably springtails
They live on surface scum on the water (if you have any) or on decaying plant material
I have a few in some of my tanks (hence the research )

Some people use them for fish food but my fish don't seem to notice them

 

[carrera]

i do have surface scum, i suppose because there is no surface movement or current in the tank, and i have some floating plants too which are probably feeding them

so far they seem to be being ignored by the fish

did u come across any way to get rid of them?

 

[Rocky32189]

They cannot be ich. Ich are parasites that are microscopic. The white dots that you see on fish infected with ich are the sores caused by the parasite's bite not the parasites themselves.

 

[carrera]

They cannot be ich. Ich are parasites that are microscopic. The white dots that you see on fish infected with ich are the sores caused by the parasite's bite not the parasites themselves.

ah, thanks for that. good to know

 

[Majjie]

........did u come across any way to get rid of them?

No, I've never completely got rid of mine but I reduced the numbers a lot by turning the filter outlet upwards so that there was more disturbance of the water surface (so no scum).

Not much help in an unfiltered tank

The only methods I could find for getting rid of them were: insecticides which were toxic to fish - or letting them completely dry out (this was for infestations in pot plants - not much help in a fish tank )

You could be extra careful about removing any dead leaves on your floating plants, you could stir up the surface every time you do a water change - to drown a few (or perhaps the fish would see them then) - and you could use pieces of kitchen towel just placed quickly on the surface of the water and then chucked away (to physically remove some) - but there are always one or two left!

 

[carrera]

gotcha, thanks

 

[Bignose]

They cannot be ich. Ich are parasites that are microscopic.

This is right, the swimmers are around 1 to 6 microns in size, or it would be a dot with a diameter the same as the width of human hair darting about. You'd need very, very good eyes for that.

The white dots that you see on fish infected with ich are the sores caused by the parasite's bite not the parasites themselves.

This part is not right. When ich is on the fish, it is called the trophont stage. The reason is it visible, is that the organism swells to 50 times its original size as it spins inside it shell.

I like to refer people to http/www.skepticalaquarist.com/docs/health/ich.shtml for an awful lot of good information about ich.