# tiny white bugs in my tadpole tank



## Spar (Mar 27, 2004)

any idea what some tiny white bugs are that are swimming in my tadpole tank could be?

they are literally pinpoint sized, but tons of them swimming around.

i assume no danger to the tads?


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## Jace King (May 5, 2004)

I had these once too, any chance your using oak leaves.


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## Spar (Mar 27, 2004)

using Almond leaves. pretty similar to oak leaves though. From South America.


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## Jace King (May 5, 2004)

Yeah i think they came off the leaves, I liked them. I figured either they are going to eat some dead crap or poop, or be eaten by my tads. Free food sources are never a problem in my opinion.


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## Darks!de (Nov 16, 2004)

Are they worm-like? I just found hundreds of nematod looking things in my sump.

Luke


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## Jace King (May 5, 2004)

More like small springtails.


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## Spar (Mar 27, 2004)

ya, more like small springtails. even smaller if possible.


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## DaFrogMan (Oct 8, 2004)

I've got both (the little bugs and the nematode looking things) in the water area in one of my vivs. I haven't seen any problems yet. I'm assuming that they aren't a problem. Would that be a correct assumption?


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## Guest (Apr 13, 2005)

Possible solution could be copepods, can you get a picture? It would also be nice if someone could move this to the proper section of the forum.


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## Guest (Apr 13, 2005)

*BUGS*

sounds like daphnia to me but i dunno how they could have got in on leaves as they are totally aquatic.


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## Darks!de (Nov 16, 2004)

No, not daphnia. You can see these pretty well. They are maybe 3-6mm and totally white. Basically like aquatic grindle worms. They are mostly on the glass, but you can see some wiggling around in the water.

Luke


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## Ben E (Oct 1, 2004)

Every tadpole tank I have set up eventually gets a healthy population of ostracods and I bet that is what you are talking about. Have you put one under a scope yet? Many of the freshwater ostracod species live in vernal ponds or just in areas where there are occasional puddles, and can tolerate periods of drying out. I think this is why you get them when you add leaves from outside. Anyway they are just harmless scavengers, but tads dont seem to like to eat them probably because of their hard shells. Read more about them here...

http://www.micrographia.com/specbiol/cr ... tr0100.htm


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## DaFrogMan (Oct 8, 2004)

Bens pictures look just like mine do. Good, now I'm not so worried.

Trey, just out of curiosity, where would you want this to be moved to?


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## Guest (Apr 14, 2005)

A reasonable place to post such a question might be the identification forum.


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## mindcrash (Mar 3, 2004)

I wouldn't be worried. I put some guppies in my tank's water feature and they made short work of these little white things.


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## DaFrogMan (Oct 8, 2004)

lol, thats a good idea Aaron.


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