Flatworms

[Demogarr]

At first, I thought "finally there is some coralline algae spreading in my tank" upon closer inspection it turned out to be little red flatworms. They did not bother me at first as they seemed to be good detritus eaters, so I left them alone ( like there was anything I could have done anyway!) Now they have super multiplied and they are everywhere! Thousands of them. They do not cover the front glass so They only bother me a little, but I want to know if they will reach a point of reproduction and level out or if they will cause problems in the future. Getting anything to eat them unless it is a good sized invert is out of the question since I am maxed out on fish and my dwarf lion will eat anything small. Just want to know if they will cause problems. Thanks!!:frank: :jackolant :spook:

[Brooke]

Only fish that I know of that will eat them are mandarins and six-line wrasses. If you didn't have the lion, a six-line might help. The only other solution that I know of is sucking as many out as you can. They are somewhat attracted to light, so you can make the room dark and put a light source on one side of the tank, then siphon them out. Do a search here on the board and you are likely to find many threads about them! did you recently add some mushrooms to the tank?

HTH-
Brooke

[Demogarr]

They came in on some live rock I added a few months ago. I went to my lfs after I got the rock and he had them in his tank, so I knew sooner or later they were coming. He has some mandarins that he said would eat them, but I did not really believe him. I went back today though and they are all gone, so maybe mandarins will eat them, does not help me either way as a mandarin is out o the question not only cause of the dwarf lion, but I like my amphipods!! My fiance does not need to read this however, because she wants a mandarin bad!!

[Brooke]

If you did get a mandarin to clean them up, you could always take it back when your problem subsides. I wrestled with flatworms long ago in our little 20g reef. We just used the suck 'em out method..and they eventually went away.

Brooke

[Demogarr]

HEHE, probably just suck them out. The problem with just getting a mandarin to clean up then take it back is that it will never go back!! That is how we got the purple tang in a 75 gallon tank. My fiance just gets too attached and we end up getting another tank to house the other fish!!

[Rick O]

I've been reading every post concerning flatworms for the last six months. It seems that there is not a fish that will with 100% certainty eat them. They also seem to follow cycles where they can be real bad at times and seem to disappear at other times. Several months ago I got them in my 120 reef tank and my smaller prop tank. I did nothing in the 120 except increase the circulation to all parts of the tank. Now I have to look real hard and can maybe find one or two. I put a six-line wrasse in the prop tank. I know he was eating them but after a few months there was still a sizable population of them. I replaced the prop tank with a 20 gal reef and transferred all of the LS and frags from the prop tank to the 20 gal. I used a powerhead to try and blow off all the flatworms from the frags as I was transferring to the 20 gal. I know some of the flatworms made it to the 20 gal in the sand and on some of the LR. At this time I can't find a single flatworm in the 20 gal. I believe a six-line can keep the population of flatworms from getting worse but they have a hard time reducing the population in an infested tank.

Good luck.

IMO, HTH, JM.02

[Doug1]

I agree with Rick, fish predators are iffy, best to siphon dilegently and hope for the best. I know several people that have gone to great lengths to rid them

[Demogarr]

Thanks for the help. I did not plan on buying any fish to help with the problem, I just wanted to know if it WAS a problem, they do not seem to bother anything except to eat detritus, so unless they cover every inch of the tank I will just leave em alone.. When they do get totally out of hand I will just manually remove some of them.

[hamburglar]

I thought I would join in on this conversation. By-the-way, this is Chris Lupton but ever since I got on this new board it puts my username up there instead. (can this be fixed Brooke ?)

I have been breeding (lol suffering) with flat worms for about a year. They cover every inch of the sand and rock that is not directly in front of a power head. I suck as many out every time I change water. I have tried chemical treatment and I would advise against that (killed all the flatworms and all the mushrooms.....flatworms came back.....mushrooms didn't). They seem to be much hardier than anything else in the tank. One day I'm gonna put some in a bowl and see what it takes to kill them. It will probably take a %50 percent bleach solution to do the trick.

On a positive note, besides my whole tank looking brown, they actually seem to eat all the hair algae in the tank.

I almost threw the toaster in the tank about 4 months ago but I have grown to live with them.

My well trusted LFS guy told me that they seem to go through a cycle and they will go away one day........................

[OodleyBoodely]

I've had one outbreak of flatworms that came in on some liverock.. I keep a mandarin and a scooter blenny that were eating them, but, I do not beleive the fish were the cause of the flatworms disappearing. They seem to have blooms when there is a lot of organic matter available, so, really cracking down on the nutrients/food in the tank may be helpful. Good luck. P.S. They don't seem to hurt anything, just unsightly.