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My male auratus tank seems to be having outbreaks of hydra. I am not certain if that is what they are, but its been mentioned as a possibility. Covering the walls and decorations are these small white spots, which after a few days are large enough that you can see them sway in the current. Admist them are tiny hair like, white "worms" as I call them for lack of a proper term...that move about. When my tank gets an outbreak, my fish starts acting very strangely. The only thing I have found thus far to kill them is to tear down the tank and clean it...however, a few weeks later they come back.

Are these hydra, and how can I get rid of them?

Pretty much hydra I had em b4 not much dmg unless u breed in that aquarium they would eat your fry. I heard Gourami's would eat em for lunch I was recommended "auqari-sol" by my lfs but I leave med for last resort. They are introduced by feeding live foods so try changing in flake foods and they will probably die off.

Hope this article helps

Gee

Hydra

Hydra, small white worms with feathery tentacles, are introduced by live foods or on plants and like snails are not harmful to adult fish. Hydra do however, thrive on fish eggs and trap fry with their tentacles and thus must be eliminated from the breeding aquarium.

Hydra can only survive on live food so they can easily be controlled by changing to a diet of flake. If your fish cannot cope with this, a careful dose of 0.5ppm Copper Sulphate will do the trick. Copper Sulphate is toxic to fish so this treatment must be a last resort and used with extreme cation. Bear in mind also that some water conditioners have a high metal ion binding capacity and may render a Copper Sulphate treatment useless. Alternatively, again assuming that you fish can cope, a raise in temperature to 108°F for four hours will kill Hydra.

Last edited by BigGee168 at 13-Feb-2005 23:39

Gee

!!I think I just learned somthing new!!

He eats flake food already...any other ideas?

Do u have plants?

And when u tear down the tank do u just clean the tank?

Gee

Gee

!!I think I just learned somthing new!!

I do not have live plants. When I tear down, I soak the rocks, and scrub the other decorations, the filtration system and tank walls and floor.

I had *huge* probs with hydras when my tank was new - and ure description sounds pretty derned hydra-esque :-P

The way I got rid of them (without chemicals - although u may find that easier) was to (every few days) scrub them off, do a water change, vacuum the gravel, and also cut my fish down to one small feed a day. My Gourami won't touch the things, either, so so much for that idea :-P

Yeah...I'm thinking about replacing all of the gravel and decorations...tho it'll get costly i'm really not sure what else to do...these critters keep coming back. All I can think of is that after a tear down, they are still in the gravel or something.

Have u tried cutting back on feeding.

Yes, I have cut back on feeding all that I could. I'm currently trying an Ick treatment recommended by my LFS...hopefully it will work

You may want to be careful with that. If it kills both hydras and ick, it'd have to be pretty strong, possibly containing copper and dyes... The problem with those is that they can harm invertebrates and plants, as well as some fish.. It persists in the tank environment long after the treatment ends :-(

Are you feeding foods that disintegrate (algae discs)? I find that these promote hydra growth.

The two fishes I have seen documented as Hydra consumers are Three Spot Gourami, Trichogaster trichopterus, and Pearl Gourami, Trichogaster leeri. Any others that are added to this list will be new to me. However, they will only do so if they are hungry. Well fed specimens contentedly burping on a nice banquet of live food or top quality flakes won't touch Hydra for the simple reason that they don't have to, and their owners are giving them far more palatable alternatives.

Put in Threespots or Pearls that have gone hungry for a few days, however, and it's a different story. Bye bye Hydra.

Also, a temperature hike will kill them. As will the old favourite, Copper Sulphate. Get hold of Interpet's Anti Snail, which contains Copper Sulphate, and use that if you need a quick solution to the Hydra problem, or find a friend with hungry Gouramis if you want the eco friendly solution

Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

Copper Sulphate solutions can be dangerous in low pH so you may want to check that first.

I treated twice with an ick cure recommended by my LFS because of the copper in it. The hydra population seemed to lessen greatly and I cleaned the tank again. Hopefully they'll be gone now..if not, so far the ick stuff has helped. My tank runs a high pH anyway, so I wasn't worried about the copper. My Auratus seems to be acting normal again finally! well, as normal as one can be!

That's cool :-) Hydras (thankfully) are fairly weak :-)