Planaria Worms in Fish Tank?
by Aquaboy on Sunday, May 2nd, 2010 | 3 Comments
My younger sister has a 20 gallon fish tank with two Silver Dollars, three Cory Doras, one Mollie, one common pleco, and one Upside Catfish. Today, when she went to clean the tank earlier, she found tiny hair-thin worms in the bucket after she siphoned the gravel. We know they are planaria worms and we have read some methods on how to get rid of them, but does anyone have anymore advice on how to take care of this problem? Also, some methods have suggested adding salt to the tank to help kill the worms, but will this harm the fish?
This is a site where I found some info:
http://www.aquariumfish.net/information/having_trouble_p2.htm
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well yes you should put salt in and it wont harm your fish but you need to put the right amount of dose in it.
feed less. That is one of the main reasons for a planaria bloom. Also, the easiest way to get rid of them is water changes. Make sure to use a gravel siphon and get deep down into that gravel. You should be doing 25% water changes every week. If you’ve been doing less than that, you need to do a 10% water change as soon as you can. Then, three days from now, do another 10% water change. This will prevent your tanks from going into shock (they will have old tank syndrome if you only do water changes once a month or so).
great im not alone on this one. i too have had these frustrateing little white worms. everyone told me to stop feeding my fish for 3 days, and do water changes every other day. well most of my fish died because of no food. so this is what i did to get rid of the worms…. i drained the 30gal tank( which is their home), put all my fish in a 10 gal tank. then washed everything in hot water(no soap). put all the gravel in big bowls and put the filter,air line, plants etc. in big plastic buckets. then i boiled water, poured it over the rock and filled the buckets. after the water cooled. i set up the tank and used hot water to fill it. i put my heater in the tank and put it as high as it would go. i left it on for 3 days then turned it off for 2 days then put my fish in the tank. and havent seen a worm in months. good luck