Asellus (Aquatic isopods)

[Azhael]

I know they are present in pools, but i´m very wary of wild crustaceans, they are vectors for way too many parasites.
I was hoping to find a captive source.

 

[Joost]

I think a healthy newt has enough resistance, when you put in some wild Asellus in your tank. The living food is most of the time also captured from the wild, so you can allready have parasites in your tank.
In my opinion, if you're too clean a newt can't build up resistance at all. I rarely have a newt lost like that.
I would not worry about it

 

[Yahilles]

Friendly vet interessed in aquaristics and wild aquatic fauna told me, that avoiding Asellus with red spots on "armour" makes chance of getting clean specimens bigger, i don't know how many truth there is.
I also plan to get Asellus into my tanks but today it's not possible to find them in Poland (winter...), probably. My target was to make them breeding in newt tank. I have lots of plants and only 3 orientalis in so it should not be hard for waterlouses to reproduce there. They would make beutiful additional life in aquarium and nice additional food for newts!

 

[Azhael]

A WC newt most probably has been exposed to the parasites and therefore the risk is perhaps insignificant. However, a CB newt has no inmunity to the parasites, and the risk of infection is higher.
no matter how big the risk is, i think it´s not the most responsible thing to offer possibly infected animals as food. Our job as hobbyists is to avoid innecessary risks.
Obviously the newts can´t build resistance without expossure, mind you they can´t get infected either.

I think a healthy newt has enough resistance, when you put in some wild Asellus in your tank. The living food is most of the time also captured from the wild, so you can allready have parasites in your tank.
In my opinion, if you're too clean a newt can't build up resistance at all. I rarely have a newt lost like that.
I would not worry about it

 

[JM29]

What precise newt parasite(s) do you think of ?

 

[michael]

What precise newt parasite(s) do you think of ?

Asselus can be intermediate hosts of Camallanidae nemotodes. My guess is the risk of introducing parasites from w.c. isopods is small and from c.b. isopods is even less. The nematodes usually show up in fish.

 

[fishkeeper]

Hmm...I would be wary of using them in that case(unless you culture them w/o fish for a long time). Assuming that includes Camallanus that affects aquarium fish those things are a terror to get rid of.

So do all newts readily eat both young and adult Asellus? Are Asellus predatory as Hyalella/Gammarus are known to be(the amphipod sp. I have here readily eat blackworms)

 

[Azhael]

Gammarids and other crustaceans are vectors for nematodes but also for parasitic fungae and god knows what else...

 

[Joost]

Azhael: I get your point. But wat about living food? Most of it is wild captured, so it can also bring parasites in tanks

 

[Azhael]

I don´t agree that most of it is wild caught. I culture live foods, or acquire them from pet-shops (which in all fairness is not a safe option).
Anyway, crustaceans are notorious for being vectors, so even if all live foods are a danger i would still consider crustaceans to be a particularly dangerous group.

 

[Yahilles]

So do all newts readily eat both young and adult Asellus? Are Asellus predatory as Hyalella/Gammarus are known to be(the amphipod sp. I have here readily eat blackworms)

Red Cherries are also feeding on chopped earthworms and bloodworms which i put into tank but i won't call them predators.

 

[fishkeeper]

I would not trust scuds with small newt larvae(chopped earthworms and bloodworms are effectively dead). Red cherries would be ok but to be honest they would probably pester the larvae.

 

[Logan]

I am very interested in this subject. My fiance is currently working on her masters degree and aquatic invertebrates is one of her classes. Right now we are going out to all types of aquatic habitat and collecting and keying things out. I find Asellus by the dozens. I am helping my fiance because I love field work but I am also looking at it as a way to maybe find a new invert to culture. Im mostly going to be looking at still water invertebrates as they should be easier to culture in captivity and more suited for the newt habitat. Oh also finding Notos is a plus. I will let you know if I have any revelations through this process.
Logan

 

[SpaceCadetHayde]

I've been thinking of adding some recently. I've had this tank cycling for a month or so with a few ghost shrimp in it but the leaves of decaying plants are becoming such a pain. I see a few of the biological supply companies have them for fairly cheap.

 

[FrogEyes]

In North America, we have many species of freshwater isopods, mainly Lirceus and Caecidotea, but with a handful of Salmasellus, Calasellus or Asellus west [mostly] of the Rockies. Many are cave-dwellers, and all are "shredders", which means they break up larger pieces of dead plants by feeding on them. While they may be vectors for generalized parasites they are mainly found in running water. In much of North America, salamanders generally do not use running water, which means there's less chance of being a vector of a salamander-specific parasite. Of course, most North American species of salamander, and most species of North American Asellota, are found in the same places I think your chances of problems would be greatly reduced if you cultured a couple generations before introducing them, and if your crustaceans came from the Great Plains. We have one subterranean species here, which I have yet to locate - they occur in cold springs in and adjacent to the mountains, and the closest epigean species I'm aware of seem to be in southern Montana. There's another pet project - to see if there might be others on the flanks of extinct volcanos on the Montana border, where there have doubtless been waters flowing through rocky cracks for millions of years.

Obviously this is something I would like to try as well, my obstacle being the distance or border crossings required to find any. Being crustaceans, I suspect they're actually quite easy to import legally, unlike insects.