Little White Swimming Bug Things in Tank

[andria]

hi! i just posted on the kingsnake forum also about these little white "bugs" that are swimming in my newt's tank. they are very very tiny, but if i look long enough i can see them moving around. does anyone know what these are? and how do i get rid of them? they got on some plants i just got in my room and killed them. they don't bother chiquita (my california newt). they aren't crawling on him or anything. they just live in the water. still i don't think they're good for the tank. any ideas?

 

[francesco]

They might be daphnia or cyclops. In this case they aren't of any harm to your newts. Instead they are good as food for newt larvae.

 

[jennifer]

I've seen various small swimmy things in tanks. Are you sure they killed the plants? That seems unlikely. Just do some extra water changes and extra gravel cleaning in the next few weeks, and they should go away. Also, be very careful not to leave any uneaten food in the tank.

 

[john]

They may not go away. Can you please describe these things in detail? There are so many little organisms that can live in aquaria that your original description doesn't really help identify them.

 

[andria]

hi! thanks to you all for writing. the little things are a whitish yellow color and so small that i don't see them unless i stare at the water to see their movement. i had ivy plants in my room that had similar looking things on them, only they made little webs on the plants. the plants were bought from wal-mart and were fine until i put them in my room. i didn't think anything of it until i got another ivy plant from a greenhouse and it got the same things on it. the plant lived for 3 weeks in our kitchen and when i put it in my room, 3 days later i noticed those little white things again. so i searched all around my room and found what looks similar in chiquita's tank. i just went and looked at them and they look a little bigger at one end than the other. they swim in every direction, not just sideways. it almost looks like they have some little propeller parts. does that help?

 

[kaysie]

rotifers? some are big enough to see with the naked eye. but almost all of them are aquatic... i dont see how they could have gotten into/out of the tank.

i should have paid more attention to invertebrate zoology.

so, if these things are swimming around in your tank, how do you suppose they got out of the tank and onto the plant? or off the plant and into the tank? i think maybe the plant thing is just a coincidence. not many invertebrates are active as both terrestrial and aquatic animals

 

[jackie]

Are they free-swimming or are they fixed onto the glass? (assuming from your posts that they are free-swimming...)

 

[i.]

There's this website that talks in some detail about various organisms that can live in your tank, how they get there and if they are good or bad etc.
Hope it helps you find out what's in yours.

http://members.aol.com/larval1/critters.htm

 

[andria]

wow! thank you all for your help! i'm pretty sure the things in chiquita's tank are just those daphnia things. that is such a relief!!! i did some research on plants and talked to a master gardener that i know and she identified the critters that eat my plants as mealy bugs that i got from other plants and carried them home on my clothes!!! yuck!! the good news is that chiquita's tank is apparently pretty healthy, the bad is that now i have to try to get rid of these other bugs!