Uso - Unidentified Swimming Object - Help!

[Rak9378]

So I was doing a water change and while vacuuming the gravel I noticed something get sucked up that sort of looked like a brine shrimp. Only it appeared to be swimming and I haven't fed my fish brine shrimp in nearly a week. So I checked the bucket and sure enough I found this little bug like critter swimming at the bottom. Picture of it is below. Sorry about the quality but this thing is tiny. Any ideas what this is? I'm not sure what info would be helpful so please ask whatever you deem necessary. I will say that my water parameters were perfect before the water change. All my fish appear to be fine and I haven't added any new fish recently. Thanks for looking!


Sorry, not sure why that picture is so small. Hopefully this is better...

 

[Meeresstille]

Maybe Daphnia?

 

[Rak9378]

Thanks Meeresstille. I looked up Daphnia and I'm not sure it really matches the pictures I'm seeing. After doing more research (including the pinned thread on hitchhikers in this forum....which I noticed after my post lol) I'm thinking this could be a Scud. I have been regularly adding plants so it could have been transported that way. From what I read they are harmless for a fish tank and could actually be beneficial (clean up) or just end up as fish food. That said I wouldn't want a population explosion of these things either!!! Lol.

Any thoughts?

 

[Meeresstille]

I've only ever had snails as hitch-hikers, and they get removed when I find them!  

 

[Donya]

That would be a Gammarid Amphipod (scud). They are indeed harmless.

 

[star4]

I have heaps of them in my tanks, and in the filters they are great little cleanup guys also some fish are rather partial to them

 

[Tongue_Flicker]

Looks like a larval stage of something haha

 

[Rak9378]

Thanks everyone for your replies! I'm happy it's nothing I need to be worried about!