Copepods, Good Bad Or Indifferent?

I have a juvenile snail in the tank, but he's much to small right now to make a difference with the algae.
 
Pods(copepods) are actualy not a bad sign. many of the 'pods ' feed on algae. as you see the fish in your tank is feeding on them..

planaria are a sign of over feeding..but they could be the result of plant matter decaying from the live plants the pods feed. and the planaria may be feeding on pods.
 
Typically planaria and other "nuisance" pests are associated with over-feeding, but this is NOT the only cause! Your horn-wort could easily have created a nitrogen rich environment with plenty of available matter for them to consum as it decayed.

As anyone who has ever had hornwort will attest to, it constantly is growing just so it can break off it seems!

Anyways, removing the plant will certainly help, and to be honest, although this may be unrelated, not feeding for 2-3 days can't hurt either.

I would be curious what your nitrAtes and TDS were prior to cleaning the tank...?

How ot get rid of them -- You've already started this by removing the plant. I would continue this by reducing the other sources fo rotting matter (ie. unwanted and/or shedding plants although not required and daily deep gravel vacs). Another suggestion, as mentioned above would be to feed them the same daily amount as you do now, but only feed them 1x every other day as opposed to the 1 a day now. It takes a while, but with enough patience they will go away.
 
I didnt take a TDS reading before the cleaning and plant removal, but the test results werent as bad as I had expected. ammo=0, nitrites=0.50, nitrates 0, ph=7.8, GH/KH=8/4(GH is normally 7, and KH has never moved)

my other plants are doing extremely well, they are all healthy and growing nicely. I still have some bits of hairy algae on the sword, but the rest, including the sword, are vibrant and beautiful. They could be doing better, but at this point I'm only dosing Excel. 5ml every other day.

I am noticing some slight algae growth on my glass again though. I clean it off every week.
 
Hooked Newbie said:
I could be way off here but from what I've read, planaria are carnivorous flatworms and are most likely feeding on the copepods and/or daphnia which are filter feeders that feed on water borne algae. As to where they possibly came from, no clue. I might try to blackout for a couple days ( or some Seachem Excel or API Algaefix) to cure the root problem. No algae, no copepods, no copepods, no planaria...
I don't think either are necessarily indicators of poor water quality, but removing all the debris can't hurt. Good luck! (It does get easy once stable btw, hang in there).
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:iagree: ;)

Can you add a filter feeding shrimp to your stock without risk of it being eaten?
 
Hooked Newbie said:
:iagree: ;)

Can you add a filter feeding shrimp to your stock without risk of it being eaten?
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I dont know, could I add shrimp? I use excel, and do plan on eventually dosing other ferts (pmdd).

I would love to have shrimp, so would my daughter.... but I'd like to know they aren't going to die.

I dont think my betta would eat the shrimp would he? how small are they?
 
DarkSoul said:
I dont know, could I add shrimp? I use excel, and do plan on eventually dosing other ferts (pmdd).

I would love to have shrimp, so would my daughter.... but I'd like to know they aren't going to die.

I dont think my betta would eat the shrimp would he? how small are they?
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Copper can harm inverts. Some say any will. Others dose with Excel and claim no ill effects (I think it's .0001 PPM). A wood shrimp might be the best option. http://www.azgardens.com/shrimpfactory.php, info here, but based on some reviews I've read you probably would want to find them elsewhere.
 
Most ferts can be problomatic, but more to the point, shrimps will work however they will do extremely poor in a tank with measurable nitrItes (or ammonia).

I have a betta with Ghosts and Red Cherrys (bu the RCS seem to keep disappearing...)
 
Whilst overfeeding may well be a cause, I set up a betta environment in a brand new 55 litre tank , ...and within 4 days I had lots of copepods.I wasn't overfeeding , 4 days of feeding 4/5 pellets a day in a brand new tank can't be overfeeding.Its a mystery, my larger established community tanks have never had them.Thankfully, I have separate gravel vacs and long gloves for each tank.I can only guess in my case they came on a plant , but my betta fish didn't eat them.My other two tanks have a regular feeding and cleaning regime and I always have crystal clear water( without chemicals) and consistently good water parameters. But I am really struggling to keep the betta tank from being over run with them and now the betta fish looks poorly.Very upsetting.
 
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