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RE: 100 small white worms
"Jamie Johnson" wrote...
>100 small white worms, ~1 mm in size.
>...verified they were planaria
Be very sure they are planaria. I too had what I thought to
be a harmless infestation of small, ~1 mm white worms.
Under a dissecting scope, they had segments and setae
(little hairs at each joint). Their mouth area did not look
very harmless. The closest thing I could compare it to was
a worm of the genus Camallanus. Making a long story short,
I scoured the web to no avail and 2 weeks later, everything
in my tank was dead. The fish would begin to bloat, die,
and then worms would stream out. The tank was dense with
them. I tried a few different worm meds and even physically
filtering them out along. Nothing worked. After everything
was dead (except one lone danio which is still in a tank,
alone with chara--"stonewort") I bleached the entire tank
and broke it down.
The very next day I found a ref to this "whiteworm scourge"
and a remedy which will probably kill your plants;
Levamisole hydrochloride at 5 ppm (parts per million)
followed by a 100% water change in 24 hours. A comercial
product was referred to called "Nilvera" but it is not water
soluble so I do not know how it would be used. The common
usage for Levamisole hydrochloride is a cattle drench and
dewormer for ostrich (hey I am just telling you what I read
:). You can probably get it at a feed store or a vet.
I realy hope what you have is not what I had. One friend of
mine swears it was shistosomiasis. I think it did come in
with some snails so maybe that theory is not as ridiculous
as it sounds.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A great many people think they are thinking when
they are only rearranging their prejudices.
-Edward R. Murrow
Dennis J. Harney
Miami University Botany Dept.