FishProfiles.com Message Forums

If anyone can give me a heads up to what this is, I'd really appreciate it.

I just took all my decorations out of the tank to clean them. There's a lot of particulates floating around in the water right now. Seems I stirred up more than food and poo. There is this infestation of really really tiny little white "things" swarming at the surface. They're not coming out of the water, and are only swimming to about inch beneath the surface. They're about 1 mm long and shaped like an oval. They swim like a fish, only a little bit jerkier. I never noticed them before today.

I only have one male betta and a snail in the tank. The tank has been set up, with both of them, since January. The betta is healthy and is showing no signs of illness. I don't think any of the "bugs" are on him - I got a flashlight and checked him tip to tail. (He's a pale pink, though, so it is hard to say for sure.) I do know that he can see them swimming around at the top of his tank, and he's not very happy.

Water parameters are perfect. The tank is a cycled 5-gallon that has been stable since February.

Any help as to what these things are, or how I can get rid of them if they're harmful, would be wonderful!

Thank you!

(P.S. Whatever these things are, they are alive. It's not just floating debry.)

Probably daphnia or similar. They only show up when your water quality is good and they are harmless. There are a lot of little critters that normally live in water and serve as fish food but multiply out of control in our tanks.

http://www.woodbridge.tased.edu.au/mdc/Species%20Register/copepods_and_ostracods.htm

Ostracods maybe??

They are probably harmless, your betta might even eat them if you don't feed him for a few days.

Last edited by trystianity at 10-Aug-2005 00:08[/font]

I had thought it might be something along the lines of copepods... Thank you sham and trystianity!

They dissapeared within minutes of me reassembling the tank. They must be living in the gravel.

I just can't figure out how they got into my tank. I don't have any live plants, and the gravel, decorations, fish, and snail came from the lfs - it's not like I went out and got something out of a pond. Oh well.

Thanks again!

I get those in my betta tanks as well... They're harmless. I just don't like when their numbers get out of control and you can see them crawling everywhere, even on the fish. I see those things crawl out of the water, just above the water line. They make little trails that you can see in the mist above the water line....

But yeah.. I've seen cherry barbs eat them like mad.

-pamela

oh they r harmless alrite..and eat rotten fuds that got stuck in the gravel..and they serve as fud for the fish as well.

I just can't figure out how they got into my tank. I don't have any live plants, and the gravel, decorations, fish, and snail came from the lfs - it's not like I went out and got something out of a pond. Oh well.

I had some in my 10 before, not sure where they came from but it was probably on live plants for me. Don't worry about it too much, decreasing feeding sometimes helps, your betta might eat them too. They've never done any harm as far as I can tell, they just look a bit unsightly.

If you see them again, just stop feeding for a few days and see if your betta will munch on them.