# Plants being eaten by mites?



## mzoorw (9 Dec 2016)

Hi all

Would appreciate some help in identifying and dealing with a very recent problem!

Have had the planted tank for over a year now, and most of the leaves have developed small holes in them. When looking closer there are many black dots about 0.5mm in diameter. 

Took a leaf out and under a microscope they are mites! See uploaded videos on YouTube here:



Thanks for reading, cannot find any way to identify them, nor any way to get rid of them!

Some extra info on tank:
Size of mites 0.5mm across. No recent additions to tank, no change in food, no added plants in last 7 months. Water pH, ammonia etc all normal. Found in tropical heated tank with one Betta, 4 cardinal tetras and algae eater, one shrimp. Fed Betta floating food, plus fish flakes. The odd algae pellet also.


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## Greenfinger2 (9 Dec 2016)

Hi Mzoorw, Best Info I could find

http://coo.fieldofscience.com/2013/05/the-mites-of-springs.html

http://www.ecospark.ca/mite


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## EnderUK (9 Dec 2016)

Pretty cool video...

You sure it's not a Potassium Deficiency causing the pin holes? Mites a probably over feeding. Try not feeding your fish for a week and see if the mite problem disappears due to hungry fish


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## three-fingers (9 Dec 2016)

Very much doubt the mites are harming the plants, from the description I would also say potassium deficiency is a possibility. Do you live in an area with soft water?

Are the mites actually on the plants underwater?  I don't know much about aquatic mites, just checked a couple of reference books but it doesn't look like any of the UK native ones, having said that I'm going by illustrations and there are probably loads of different species not in the books. The mites are probably causing no harm at all, I'm just curious as to what species they are. Good detailed videos!


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## zozo (10 Dec 2016)

Great video's.. Thanks. 
Water mites indeed seem to be predatory in adult live, daphnia seems to be one of their common food source.. In larvae stage they are parasitic on insect and or fresh water clams.. But there are many of them and not all are yet fully described.. The most common water mite is the red one.

2 undescribed water mites..





Small list of most commonly found in fresh water..



_1  Limnochares aquatica 
2  Hydryphantes altomontanus 
3  Unionicola ypsilophora 
4  Piona nodata 
5  Arrenurus globator 
6  Arrenurus bruzelii 

No 3. Is lives in Europe and North america. Could be the dark one in the first pic.  Parasitic on freshwater clams.. _

_They seem to produce a nasty substance for protection against predators, if an amfibian or fish tries to eat it, it's immediately spit  out again.. The only mite predator known which could live in our tanks is Hydra. _

_Undescribed Litho with watermites from J.green 1907. 


 _


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## mzoorw (14 Dec 2016)

Thank you all for the responses!

I have used potassium supplements AND starved my fish for 3 days. I can say one of them worked!! Both mites and holes have gone from new growth.

Hope you guys appreciated the videos, finally got some use out of the 400X Maplin microscope I bought a few years back.


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## Uslanja (2 Jan 2017)

Mites???  That is GREAT!!!!  The one thing I miss from our reef days is the incredible variety of life that we would discover.  Freshwater does not have the variety that saltwater does.  One item we had contemplated back then but never did purchase was a good microscope.  I think your discovery is simply fascinating!  Any way to post some microscope shots of the mites?


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## HiNtZ (27 Jan 2017)

Uslanja said:


> Mites???  That is GREAT!!!!  The one thing I miss from our reef days is the incredible variety of life that we would discover.  Freshwater does not have the variety that saltwater does.  One item we had contemplated back then but never did purchase was a good microscope.  I think your discovery is simply fascinating!  Any way to post some microscope shots of the mites?



I had a dragonfly larva in mine once


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## three-fingers (31 Jan 2017)

I've had damselfly larvae a few times, I presume they come as unseen eggs to plants, I usually leave them be unless they are eating too many fish fry.

This guy moulted a few weeks ago and lived in the house for a couple of days before falling in one of my pitcher plants (was too cold to let it outside):


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## limz_777 (2 Feb 2017)

did you add anything from a pond or something ?


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## three-fingers (2 Feb 2017)

Not specifically from a pond, in the previous months I had only added a potted Tropica plant from Pets@Home, a couple of cuttings from other indoor tropical tanks and a piece of floating plant from a member here.

I do usually leave my windows open, so it possibly flew in during summer when I wasn't looking.


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## HiNtZ (7 Feb 2017)

I had dragonfly larva hatch out of plants from Pets at home too, several times. I don't go there anymore.


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