Question About Planaria?

[rebrn]

OK a little background on the subject. I had A LOT of planaria during my cycle of the 55 gallon tank, even after I completed the final water change I still had a fair few. I added the fish (checked the stats first and all was good) and the following day no further planaria, until today. I woke up and turned on the tank, checked on the fish, fed them and noticed a single planaria in the tank free swimming, then it got sucked in to the filter. Now I know planaria is a sign of bad water, and as the water changes on all the tanks is due tomorrow I went ahead and check water stats this morning. They were:

Ammonia 0 (all tanks)
Nitrite 0 (all tanks)
Nitrate 10 (12 and 55 gallon) 5-10 (5 gallon)
pH 7.4 (12 and 55 gallon) 7.2 (5 gallon)

Now the stats look fine to me, and in fact the stats for the 55 and 12 gallon are exactly the same, but the planaria is only (and has ever only been) in the 55 gallon tank. Also, the planaria showed up after I had the temperature mishap in the 55 gallon tank; see thread http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?/topic/316528-temp-got-too-high-what-should-i-do/.

So my question is, once you have planaria is it always there regardless of water quality, or could it have something to do with the temp issue I had yesterday, or should I be worried that there is something further wrong in the 55 gallon tank?

Again I only saw one single planaria this morning, and after it got sucked into the filter I have not seen any since.

Thanks

 

[OldMan47]

There will probably always be a few that can reproduce whenever there is decaying food on the tank bottom. The longer you go between cleanings, the more they can reproduce.

 

[waterdrop]

And they're harmless. Some fish will gobble them up if they see them. --wd--