# How to get rid of little white worms



## J-Lo (Feb 2, 2006)

I just notice this today after i fed my pygos night crawlers. I do about a 50% water change everyweek and just prazi proed and salted the tank. Any reason why these guys are in my tank and how do you get rid of them? i would assume prazi would of killed them off. Thanks for any infos.


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## Piranha_man (Jan 29, 2005)

1.) It's planaria.

2.) They are the result of uneaten food in your tank / not enough water changes.

3.) You can get rid of them by turning your temperature up to the high 80s and doing 50% water changes daily for a few days, being sure to vacuum the substrate, especially under and around decor. (You don't need to, nor should you add meds for this problem.)

4.) This topic belongs under "Disease/Injury Forum."


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## blazednosferatu (Feb 27, 2006)

I believe they come from unaten food thats left in the tank too long, i also have them in my 180 and are very hard to get rid of and cant get rid of them


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## J-Lo (Feb 2, 2006)

Thanks a bunch guys


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## jordan123 (May 16, 2007)

A big water change and some gold fish


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## dalyhawk (Apr 30, 2007)

jordan123 said:


> A big water change and some gold fish


i would have to disagree...

Although goldfish do eat the little boogers pretty well... the only way you're gonna get rid of them is if you do very frequent, small water changes AFTER you do a decent size water change.

I'm talking about a 30-50% water change day 1, then day 2, do a 20% change, day 3, do a 10-20% change, day 4 (if need be) do a 10-15% change.

Problem that you run into:

-risk of disease from goldfish if you get a bad one/batch

If you do a few very large water changes within a couple days or even a week (in my opinion), you're 1. stressing out your fish 2. messing up the pH a lot by doing big changes and often 3. chance of messing up drasically with your water temperature 4. messing up your beneficial bacteria momentarily 5. risk of not putting enough dechlorinator in your water which is obviously bad.

Basically all of them boil down to stressing out your fish hardcore. Too much pH change, stress. Too big of a decline/increase of water temp = stress. You get the point.
Take it for what it's worth, but that's my opinion


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## rolly_169 (Jul 23, 2007)

they could be nematodes as well. are they on the glass or scriggling around in the water


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## Nevermind (Aug 16, 2007)

jordan123 said:


> A big water change and some gold fish


i find tetras last longer and eat them just as well


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## Ja'eh (Jan 8, 2007)

Planaria are very hard to get rid of but they are harmless to your fish, they're more of an eye sore than anything. Pretty much all you can do is what the above members suggested. They can be benifecial because I had the same problem a few months ago until I had an amonia spike! I treated my shoal in 2 seperate tanks that I keep running unstocked with piranhas. Befor this spike became obvious I had noticed that these worms were gone, I guess because of their small size they could not handle the amonia levels befor it was visable on my p's. I usually do an amonia test once a week but during this periode it had been about 2 weeks or so since my last test. In other words they can be a good natural detector of amonia lol!


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## Dr. Giggles (Oct 18, 2003)

Extra gravel vacs, scrubbings, and added mechanical filtration


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## Piranha_man (Jan 29, 2005)

jordan123 said:


> A big water change and some gold fish


Adding goldfish could very possibly be exchanging one problem for another, more serious one.


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## Piranha Dan (Nov 11, 2007)

Dr. Giggles said:


> Extra gravel vacs, scrubbings, and added mechanical filtration


Exactly. It worked for me.


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## Piranha_man (Jan 29, 2005)

And turn the heat up.


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