# microscopic mystery animal



## oddjob-ding (6 Jun 2012)

Hi all

Firstly this is my first post as a new member so hello to all.

Have seen these mystery animals in my small tank i am using for Ramshorn snails, I noticed them when i was using a 10x magnifying glass to look at some snail eggs. 






The picture is poor i know but these animals are tiny and only visible with a magnifying glass, firstly what they are not, they are not planaria , they are not nematodes ( i worked briefly for forest research on Hylobius abietis bio control with Steinernematidae sp nematodes and have seen many in a microsope. I dont believe they are parasitic trematodes.

These thread like creatures move like a caterpillar on the glass of the tank, with a oval head you can almost see rudimentary legs (stumps). They do not swim like nematodes (snake like) and i have seen them next to both nematodes and flatworms.

I have looked everywhere i can on the net from google, youtube too many many macro fauna invert websites I cant find anything that resembles it.

anyone know what it is? Are they harmless to fish and humans?

And no its not the Lochness monster!!!!!!!!!!


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## billy boy (6 Jun 2012)

Looks like Planaria to me, Check the link out   


http://www.planetinverts.com/what_is_th ... arium.html


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## oddjob-ding (6 Jun 2012)

it doesn't look anything like this, its translucent, moves like a "CATERPILLAR" not "SNAKE" isn't a flatworm eg Planaria and is thread like not slug like, has no visible eyes its "microscopic" with a x10 magnifying glass it is only just visible! I have seen flat worms swimming next to them there are hundreds if not thousands of them I can only see the ones on the glass!


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## sr20det (6 Jun 2012)

Solely snails in tank?  Assume if there were fish these would have been munched?  Or are they too small maybe only fry would see?


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## oddjob-ding (6 Jun 2012)

Just snails, (many many many snails willing to give away when they are bigger, if anyone wants any), i dont think these things are trematodes a well known parasite of ramshorns tho not sure if this is parasite is common in the UK.


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## frothhelmet (7 Jun 2012)

I have these in my shrimp only tanks. I dont know what they are, but they are only about .5cm long. They sometimes like to swim by flicking their bodies back and forth, but the mostly crawl on the glass like a caterpillar. They are not planaria. Fish like to eat them though. Dont worry if you got them. They are harmless food.


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## sparkyweasel (7 Jun 2012)

oddjob-ding said:
			
		

> And no its not the Lochness monster!!!!!!!!!!



Are you sure it's not the monster's mysterious larval stage?

Anyway, welcome.

The looping movement suggests some kind of leech, but the stumpy legs are confusing, I don;t think any leeches have those. Larval insects sometimes have stumpy legs or pseudolegs, maybe that would be another group to look into. Are there any tiny insects in the tank, or inside the lid?


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## oddjob-ding (7 Jun 2012)

I dont think its a leech, tho not sure what fish leech look like, i did at first think it was maybe a fly larva of some sort  (live in highlands, midge land) but doesn't look anything like any midge lava i have seen. Certainly no insects hanging around the lid of the tank.

I have only found one thing that loosely resembles it, a commonly found annelid (back to the leech ?) forgot its family but after looking at all the photos i could find decided it wasn't close enough. Would fish leech occur in huge numbers?

My main concern is i am currently cycling a larger tank, when i add fish after the cycle completion i was going to add a few snails but if its a parasite i don't want to add problems.


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## sr20det (7 Jun 2012)

Can you not introduce a small fish for a short period of time, I would have thought it would take care of it.  Young Guppy or something?


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## dw1305 (11 Jun 2012)

Hi all,
Other than the legs it sounds like a Leech, try adding a bit of prawn to the tank, you should see them head towards it wit lots of looping and waving of the body. Another way of telling is that leeches are very adhesive, and stick in much more strongly than _Planaria_. Hydra can also "loop", but much more slowly.

Have a look at "Microscopy UK", that has images of lots of "pond life" <http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/mag....microscopy-uk.org.uk/mag/articles/hydra.html>. 

cheers Darrel


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## oddjob-ding (1 Jul 2012)

I believe the mystery is now solved  

I have very strong reasons to believe these are (fanfare) Chironomidae sp. (commonly know as non biting midge larva or bloodworms)

The reason i believe this is because i have suddenly had a huge number or red worm like creatures appear in the tank red segmented worms, some with fluffy white tufts that wriggle to the surface, linger for a moment then drop back down to the bottom. Exhausting to watch as they seem to do this all day i think ( haven't sat and watched for that long). These are pupa about to change to adults.

I think the original reported mystery creature is a first instar stage which is why they were so difficult to identify. Quick link to lifecycle info http://lazy-lizard-tales.blogspot.co.uk ... idges.html its the first page i found on google.

Anyhow saw one on the surface on top of the filter and squashed it, a few minutes later when i looked it was being swarmed with baby snails eating it, including a rarely seen Malaysian trumpet snail. The original creatures seem to have all but disappeared, not sure if this is because of the many water changes i have done or they have moved along in the life cycle.

Who knows where they came from, I only use bottled mineral water as it is a snail tank and our tap waters pH is 6.6 and cheap bottled water is well above 7 (its a small tank) only place these could have come from are excess plants i have put in from a larger tank when i was raising tadpoles which I originally got from a pool in the field opposite my house, along with the spawn came many hundreds of water fleas and some unidentified creatures. tadpoles ate the daphnia but suspect the bloodworm came from there and were transported with plants.

Really the mystery is how did the daphnia get into the pool i took the spawn from. The only reason I took the spawn was because this pool (puddle) often dried out completely. There are no lakes or rivers close by!!! So how to daphnia and other aquatic inverts colonise new pools?


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## Liam (1 Jul 2012)

Once the daphnia are in a pond they can survive drying out by laying resting eggs that have a protective shell like brine shrimp or annual killifish. They can colonise new ponds in times of flooding and it is thought likely that the resting eggs can be transported on the feet and legs of migrating birds. 
Glad your mystery is solved.


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