Planarians Attacked Neon Tetra

[Wreckzone]

Hi everyone,
 
I'm new to the forum and I signed up today to specifically ask (and warn) about planarian.
 
Last night I witnessed a horrible, terrifying scene, but I'll get to that in a minute.
 
My 6 gallon Fluval Edge was hit with a fungus outbreak a few month ago and two of my five neon tetras developed cotton mouth, or mouth rot. At the time, I read online somewhere that these white balls were common among neon tetras and if the neons weren't in distress they would be fine and the white balls would pop on their own. Well, yesterday morning I noticed one of the females with cotton mouth swimming around erratically and flashing on the sides of the aquarium. I knew something was wrong so I called my LFS and asked what to do about this neon with cotton mouth. They recommended I do a 50% water change and dose Pimafix for 7 days. 
 
Now, I'm in the process of doing my water change and usually when I do this my neon tetras would go off and shoal together or hide in the plants or bogwood. After filling the tank up with water and dosing the Pimafix I closed the lid and took a look at how my fish were doing. Shockingly, I saw the sick neon stuck face first in the bogwood flapping its tail around trying to get out. This small piece of bogwood had a lot of roots and cut branches so naturally it had a lot of small crevices...and my poor, sick neon managed to get its head stuck in it!
 
So I frantically took the lid off the tank and reached down, pinched the neon by the tail and softly tugged on it. There was a bit of movement but it seemed like something was caught or snagged in the bogwood. I thought to myself the gills were getting caught on something so I stopped and took a few seconds to think before my next move. The neon thrashed around again and manged to dislodge itself from the bogwood but it swam back into the crevice and got stuck again! Geez.....I thought, "This neon is just trying to hide from me!". So then I reached in and took it by its tail again and pulled hard. Yes! I managed to free it!
 
I dropped the neon on the sand, took my hand out of the aquarium and stood in front of the glass to observe. I was horrified....I saw about four or five planarians crawling on and in and out of this poor neon's face! I was stunned. I quickly gathered myself, and with my wife's assistance, prepared clove oil to quickly euthanize Cindy, if she wasn't already dead yet.
 
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Has anyone ever witnessed this before? Or even heard about it? I knew planarian fed on fish food and decaying plant matter, but never on live fish! I've searched across the internet today but I haven't read anything on this. Should I be worried about planarian attacking my other neons?!?
 
Lesson learnt though: Always stay on top of your scheduled water changes, keep your tank clean and take out any uneaten fish food and decaying plant matter! You might be feeding these little monsters, Planarian!
 

 

[CSnyder00]

I go fishing every year in Maine. During the summers, the fish there get green spots on their fins and in their gills and all over the place. You have to carefully check each fish you catch before you keep it to ensure it doesn't have these spots. Reason why you ask? Because these green spots are actually eggs/larve for a planaria or flatworm that will hatch inside the fish and then make its way out of the fish through the digestive system and out for other fish or birds to get infected. I've actually filleted a fish and found live ones in the meat. Cooking the meat kills the worms, but I won't eat any fish that has them. A very badly infected fish can die from it. Most of this is caused by poor water quality somewhere in line in the aquarium hobby. The fish picks up the worms somewhere and then they will be dormant until the fish get stressed by poor water quality and then the worms attack. Much like ich.

 

[nic1]

Oh poor fish, sounds awful
I've read that loads of water changes, minimal fish feeding, and removal of any decaying plant matter can starve them off.

Welcome to the forum by the way

 

[Ch4rlie]

Normally if you have planeria, you'll see them on the glass of your tank, tiny wriggling worms, usually white and in numbers.
 
This sounds like more of an internal parasite rather than planeria.

 

[Wreckzone]

Thanks for responding everyone and thanks for the welcome Fish Crazy 

 
About two months ago I went crazy on plants and purchased a big batch of cabombas for my fish to hide in. They seemed to love swimming in it. I have a video of them swimming in it:
 
http/youtu.be/UCDC6rcCVHQ
 
The cabombas took a long time to adapt to my aquarium and so a lot of it rotted and are still rotting however I see some new growth. I'd say I have about a quarter of the cabombas left. This obviously contributed to my poor water quality but I'm usually pretty good with my water changes. Looking back now I should have changed more water or done more frequent water changes.
 
I had an outbreak of planeria about a year ago so perhaps these worms were not planaria. I also recall some small, brown flat worms that hitchhiked on some hornwort I purchased two years ago. I thought these flatworms all died because I haven't seen any in my tank for years. Perhaps these flatworms infected that neon and only hatched when my water quality got poor?
 
I also plugged my heater back in which I unplugged at the beginning of summer because I was afraid my neons, shrimps and snail would get uncomfortable in 30+ degrees C. My home doesn't have central air and the fluval heater doesn't have settings to set at a maximum temperature. My LFS told me neons can handle infections better and warmer water keeps their immune systems up so I'll keep it plugged in all the time from now on. Even after 5 years of taking care of this tank I am still learning!

 

[fm1978]

My only experience of planaria was in my very first tank when I came to upgrade it. During the process of taking the old one down I started to see dark, flat worms. I read a bit about them and found that they are a threat to small fish and shrimplets but not normally to adult fish. 
 
It is possible to treat with cat/dog de-worming tablets but I'm not sure of the preparation method.