Flatworms

The way I look at it is this, it's a newly setup tank about at the end of it's initial cycle and you have a flatworm bloom. You can use the methods of suck them out with a small air hose or a little larger hose when you do a WC, or even once a week. Or you can do that along with the flatworm exit which will kill them. One other OR is that you can get the wrasse that will eat them like candy it's whole life.

What would I do? I'd probably get the wrasse :D
 
It's these
0ba0677dde109136a975d337a594012d.jpg

That's the correct ID. Personally I would leave those. Once you add fish they will go away. I don't believe they are as invasive as say Red Planeria.
 
newer systems often undergo all sorts of 'blooms' of various types, not just nuisance algae/diatoms etc. you're likely to see 'patches' of lots of things as (more) unstable parameters become (more) stable. just strive to keep things clean and relatively nutrient low/free while 'breaking things in' and it 99.44% of the time works itself out. hydroids, byrozoans, aips, forams... it's a long list ;)

once that happens, it becomes more 'ebb and flow' between various colonies of 'good stuff'-one month you'll have more sponge, then, more tunicates, or dusters, ad infinitum.
 
newer systems often undergo all sorts of 'blooms' of various types, not just nuisance algae/diatoms etc. you're likely to see 'patches' of lots of things as (more) unstable parameters become (more) stable. just strive to keep things clean and relatively nutrient low/free while 'breaking things in' and it 99.44% of the time works itself out. hydroids, byrozoans, aips, forams... it's a long list ;)

once that happens, it becomes more 'ebb and flow' between various colonies of 'good stuff'-one month you'll have more sponge, then, more tunicates, or dusters, ad infinitum.
Yeah but if I need to do something about the possible hydroids, I need to do it now. Just like the flatworms, which I have decided to use flatworms exit on. I emailed wetwebmedia to see if they can give me an answer to the possible hydroids
 
LOL those are not hydroids, they're little algae plants growing on the glass.

Yes unfortunately the wrasse will eat pods.
 
LOL those are not hydroids, they're little algae plants growing on the glass.

Yes unfortunately the wrasse will eat pods.


I think they are. Wetwebmedia just confirmed it but I am going to wait it
Out and see what happens. Not algae though. I scraped them
Off the glass( thousands) and I stuck
My arm in the tank to grab something and they stung me. Like prickly feeling. I washed it off really well though, so hopefully nothing happens:/
 
Will a melanarus compete with a mandarin in the long run?
Yes. No wrasses for you.

To me the ones on the glass look like hydroids. People get confused because there are a few types, colonial hydroids are much more of a threat because they cluster and sting in a particular spot, but these aren't those. These are just hydroids, the regular new tank kind. They have a jellyfish-type of lifecycle pictured here
Life%20cycle%202.jpg

They look very much like aiptasia, and alight on a surface to filter feed, then send out little snowflakes in the water. I think a lot of fish eat them since they are almost never a problem (as opposed to the other colonial type that post up on a spot and start claiming territory).

I, like many others, had a bloom in my tank until I added a fish. Then I never saw anymore little snowflakes on the glass or aiptasia-ish things on the rocks for over a year. A month or so ago I moved some rock into the sump to clean it up away from the light for my tank upgrade ... immediately covered in hydroids. And now I see the occasional snowflake doing the weird jelly swim in my DT.

My first fish was a chalk bass, hardly known for pod predation but he cleared out the DT of hydroids anyway, or else some kinda bigger worm took hold like a peanut or spaghetti. The melanurus probs helped too, I got him about 6 months in. If you're trying to culture micro food for a mandarin, you will see your tank blow up with stuff like this. It's good to be cautious about which things you allow to proliferate. These hydroids are not the critters you need to worry about though. The flatworms might be a diff story. I'd not let that get out of hand.

EDIT: here's a pic of the ones in my sump. It was aiptasia-ish enough to scare me so I posted a thread on it. It didn't occur to me that I might still have hydroids around since I hadn't seen them for over a year. But the consensus was that I do, they were just hiding and waiting for the opportunity. It's kinda remarkable how resilient these critters can be, especially hitchikers. Respeto!
 

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PS I forgot to say they can hurt fry. So if you're thinking of breeding fish, it's an issue, but anything big enough to sell to you isn't going to suffer from a hydroids sting. If they did they wouldn't eat them ;)
 
I think they are. Wetwebmedia just confirmed it but I am going to wait it
Out and see what happens. Not algae though. I scraped them
Off the glass( thousands) and I stuck
My arm in the tank to grab something and they stung me. Like prickly feeling. I washed it off really well though, so hopefully nothing happens:/

That's interesting to hear, I have had those in the past and no longer have them. I honestly figured they were just algae growing and did't pay them much attention. I also guess that I have thick skin as I didn't get stung by them, and don't by my BTA's. Not that I handle them a lot, but even doing things in the tank with my arms or hand will brush up against them.
 
Yes. No wrasses for you.

To me the ones on the glass look like hydroids. People get confused because there are a few types, colonial hydroids are much more of a threat because they cluster and sting in a particular spot, but these aren't those. These are just hydroids, the regular new tank kind. They have a jellyfish-type of lifecycle pictured here
Life%20cycle%202.jpg

They look very much like aiptasia, and alight on a surface to filter feed, then send out little snowflakes in the water. I think a lot of fish eat them since they are almost never a problem (as opposed to the other colonial type that post up on a spot and start claiming territory).

I, like many others, had a bloom in my tank until I added a fish. Then I never saw anymore little snowflakes on the glass or aiptasia-ish things on the rocks for over a year. A month or so ago I moved some rock into the sump to clean it up away from the light for my tank upgrade ... immediately covered in hydroids. And now I see the occasional snowflake doing the weird jelly swim in my DT.

My first fish was a chalk bass, hardly known for pod predation but he cleared out the DT of hydroids anyway, or else some kinda bigger worm took hold like a peanut or spaghetti. The melanurus probs helped too, I got him about 6 months in. If you're trying to culture micro food for a mandarin, you will see your tank blow up with stuff like this. It's good to be cautious about which things you allow to proliferate. These hydroids are not the critters you need to worry about though. The flatworms might be a diff story. I'd not let that get out of hand.

EDIT: here's a pic of the ones in my sump. It was aiptasia-ish enough to scare me so I posted a thread on it. It didn't occur to me that I might still have hydroids around since I hadn't seen them for over a year. But the consensus was that I do, they were just hiding and waiting for the opportunity. It's kinda remarkable how resilient these critters can be, especially hitchikers. Respeto!

Good info, :thumbsup:
 
Yes. No wrasses for you.

To me the ones on the glass look like hydroids. People get confused because there are a few types, colonial hydroids are much more of a threat because they cluster and sting in a particular spot, but these aren't those. These are just hydroids, the regular new tank kind. They have a jellyfish-type of lifecycle pictured here
Life%20cycle%202.jpg

They look very much like aiptasia, and alight on a surface to filter feed, then send out little snowflakes in the water. I think a lot of fish eat them since they are almost never a problem (as opposed to the other colonial type that post up on a spot and start claiming territory).

I, like many others, had a bloom in my tank until I added a fish. Then I never saw anymore little snowflakes on the glass or aiptasia-ish things on the rocks for over a year. A month or so ago I moved some rock into the sump to clean it up away from the light for my tank upgrade ... immediately covered in hydroids. And now I see the occasional snowflake doing the weird jelly swim in my DT.

My first fish was a chalk bass, hardly known for pod predation but he cleared out the DT of hydroids anyway, or else some kinda bigger worm took hold like a peanut or spaghetti. The melanurus probs helped too, I got him about 6 months in. If you're trying to culture micro food for a mandarin, you will see your tank blow up with stuff like this. It's good to be cautious about which things you allow to proliferate. These hydroids are not the critters you need to worry about though. The flatworms might be a diff story. I'd not let that get out of hand.

EDIT: here's a pic of the ones in my sump. It was aiptasia-ish enough to scare me so I posted a thread on it. It didn't occur to me that I might still have hydroids around since I hadn't seen them for over a year. But the consensus was that I do, they were just hiding and waiting for the opportunity. It's kinda remarkable how resilient these critters can be, especially hitchikers. Respeto!


Thank you! Yeah I'm gonna just wait it out and see what happens. Hopefully they don't progress into something uncontrollable. I just haven't had to deal with them before, so naturally I freaked out. Normally I wouldn't, but after finding aipstasia and flatworms, I figured I was doomed haha
 
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