ID please

[malmom]

I just found these little black worms all over in my dwarf seahorse tank. They seem to come out when I turn the lights out. Any ideas? Are they bad or good??? They are very small.....tiny to 1/2 inch...

 

[malmom]

no one knows what this is?????

 

[Jan]

baby seahorses?

 

[returnofsid]

Funny that Jan should say that. When I read your original post and looked at your first picture, that's the first thing I thought of too. I have no idea what it could be though.

 

[vwmoneypit]

i think that my first thaought tooo.. ummm research it on some sites ....here we go get on marinedepot and contact a bioligst that has that background of knowledge to help ...congrats that my answer, dont change anything in it till u find out !!!!

 

[britany_shelton]

wow, you got me stumped. how may seahorses?

 

[malmom]

Their not seahorses their little worm like things that go in the substrate when the lights are turned on and only come out when it's dark, they don't swim, they stay mostly on the substrate when they are out and sometimes they get up on the glass. Got me stumped too. There are hundreds of them though....

 

[Penny]

Tubifex worms?

I am so new, I shouldn't be posting any advice, but I've been doing a ton of research on worms, and hitchhikers, and these sound like they maybe tubifex worms. (??)

 

[britany_shelton]

wow. I will try my best to think of what they are exactly.

 

[returnofsid]

If you could get a hold of Leslie, she could ID. Better pics might help. Try to get clear close ups if possible.

 

[NaH2O]

malmom - I'm stumped right now. I'll do some more checking, and see if Boomer has any ideas.

 

[Boomer]

Nope Nikki, none of hand need a better pic. I looked at this the other day

 

[NaH2O]

*merged the two threads together. Otherwise, we'd be working off of two threads and not know what's going on in the other.

Wow Boomer. I had a thread awhile back where I had some very tiny black worms on the base of a coral. We had decided they were part of clean up. The black worms on mine were smaller than pictured above though.

Malmom - any chance of you sucking one of those out of the tank and looking at it through a magnifying glass? and/or taking a close up picture on a white background possibly through a magnifying glass?

 

[polydactyl]

they arent tubifex worms.........tubifex are longer and occur in freshwater(well i guess sewage isnt really THAT fresh). i would guess perhaps some type of protein worm(generally harmless)....i've seen similar looking worms in freshwater. but ya know the old adage...if in doubt...take it out. i would certainly go through the substrate with a syphon and remove what you can.