# Planaria



## Tardigrade (Apr 17, 2017)

My divided betta tank has lots of little critters like scuds, snails, shrimp, snail leeches, and now planaria! I have lots if live plants. My other tanks not affected. 
The planaria remind me of fern gully if anyone remembers that. 
They come out in droves when I feed my fish. I am not gonna lie, they are creepy. To say they are cleaning up is an understatement. They come get the food before my fish do sometimes. Strangely, my fish always look full even if I did not feed them all day. I really do not know for sure what is bad except there seems to be a widespread fear of them and they need to be erradicated ASAP or they WILL get your shrimp. Ok, but what about my fish? I don't want to dump meds in my tank and wipe out all my cool ecosystem if not necessary.
So sorry for the choppy write up.
But do the planaria harm bettas?
Do bettas eat planaria? I have so far not seen my bettas eat them.
My snails are getting eaten by something, but I don't care too much. My shrimp is fine. My tank gets 50% water change/vacuum every week. 

Is this a valid concern? Or am I feeding the fear machine? Since planaria seem to be mainly scavengers, if I stop feeding my tank, will they take down my fish?
Like my bristlenose pleco loves veggies, but if I skip a week my plants get mowed down.


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## trahana (Dec 28, 2015)

Well, Planaria are predatory flat worms, meaning they eat flesh. Can they harm your betta? If they are hungry, I'm sure they will latch on and take a bite out. Considering you have a swarm, it sounds like a bad thing.

Bettas may or may not eat planaria. They aren't a good method to remove planaria.


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## ryry2012 (Mar 31, 2015)

I've never had them in my tanks. This is all I know.
Although they are creepy, they wouldn't harm fish or shrimp. Betta won't eat them. You would like to look into a product called Planaria Zero. It’s safe for fish, shrimp and plants. Dog dewormer would also work.


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## Tardigrade (Apr 17, 2017)

Well thanks for reassuring me... Of my fears. I will have to find something to kill all my planaria hopefully.


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## Veloran (Jun 28, 2014)

Are you sure it's planaria and not detritus worms? If you look very closely at the worms, planaria are more flat and have a spear tipped head, the detritus worms are more round.

Detritus worms are decomposters and usually when you see a tank infested with little white worms, the are these worms. They're not harmful to the tank, but means that the tank needs some more cleaning.

After losing my fry to planaria, I did a little research.
Planaria are predatory and are usually present in smaller numbers that detritus worms. While generally harmless, they can infect weak fish (SIP my little fry) or sometimes fish resting on the bottom. Shrimp are susceptible when they're molting.

Outside of the chemical methods mentioned, you can also use API General Cure but you will need two full rounds and I'm still not 100% convinced it got all the planaria from my tank. You can also use a more natural method that I heard of but haven't tried. Take a small water bottle, use a pin to punch four tiny holes at the bottom and put some different types of fish food inside. Fill it and leave it inside the tank, the planaria should be able to squeeze themselves into the bottle to get the food. You then dump out the water every morning and repeat for a few days. I haven't tried this myself to see how it works.


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## Tardigrade (Apr 17, 2017)

I have detritus worms too. All my fish love to eat them. But the planaria! I do not know where they came from. Planaria are sensitive to ammonia I just read. I might do some experimenting. I wonder if that is why they never appeared in my other tanks? This tank has a very small bioload and lots of plants. Hmmmm. I will try trapping them maybe and see if copper will kill them.


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