What is this?
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108 Posts
Sorry 
Did you just introduce something new to the viv? I learned the hard way to give all new plants a lengthy quarantine time because despite my best plant-cleaning efforts I got nemerteans as well.
Did you just introduce something new to the viv? I learned the hard way to give all new plants a lengthy quarantine time because despite my best plant-cleaning efforts I got nemerteans as well.
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114 Posts
i know that these ugly things eat up microfauna, but how bad are they to have in vivs with frogs, i mean do most of you break down a tank because you find some or try to remove them by hand or just try to ignore them? i can see how in smaller tanks their population will boom and destroy microfauna, which is what seems to be happening in my cristobal froglets viv so im considering taking it down and starting another. I'm reluctant because i have read of many people who tore down, sterilized and started another tank only to find them again, bummer because they are so gross looking.
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114 Posts
yea i learned recently that the dead fruit flies on the glass were victims of the nemertean. it would be interesting to actually see one consuming a ff.
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Do a search for a thread started by me titled "Worm ID" and you'll see one eating a ff. I heard that they eat isopods too but the isopod population in that tank is still going strong.
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108 Posts
I have had no luck whatsoever in keeping isopods alive in my infected 29 gallon. The frog resident is a single leucomelas that I just keep giving multiple feedings per day since nothing stays alive for many hours. Can't wait to get his new home finished up.
If you haven't seen a nemertean eating a fly yet, I expect you soon will.
If you haven't seen a nemertean eating a fly yet, I expect you soon will.
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1,770 Posts
Yeah, I've found that dwarf whites still survive and breed just fine despite nemerteans. I have the worms in 3 vivs and all three have large surviving long-term populations of white isos, while the springtails are long gone.
There have been some trials to find a predator of them and using othere methods to get rid of them(see this site for example AJCs Frogroom: Search results for nemerteans). I haven't found a good reference for the potential species.
Ed
Here's a quote from that link Ed, it seems like woodlouse (isopods) eat the young nemerteans and their eggs, so this would be a method of control...chalk one more up for the ispods, what can't they do?!?!
'I've recently had a limited degree of success in reducing the Nemertean populations in contaminated vivaria by adding the woodlouse Oniscus asellus to the vivarium at the rate of approximately one per five litres of vivarium space. This reduces but does not eliminate the Nemerteans, presumably because the woodlice consume the eggs or young worms. The effect wanes with time as Oniscus asellus does not seem to like wet vivaria and any offspring produced are consumed by frogs or Nemerteans, so the population is not sustained at the necessary level for control. Oh well, it's a start.'
'I've recently had a limited degree of success in reducing the Nemertean populations in contaminated vivaria by adding the woodlouse Oniscus asellus to the vivarium at the rate of approximately one per five litres of vivarium space. This reduces but does not eliminate the Nemerteans, presumably because the woodlice consume the eggs or young worms. The effect wanes with time as Oniscus asellus does not seem to like wet vivaria and any offspring produced are consumed by frogs or Nemerteans, so the population is not sustained at the necessary level for control. Oh well, it's a start.'
it seems like isopods, potentially any isopod would eat nermetean eggs and young, but conversely the nermetean adults would eat the iso eggs and young. So, if you killed adult nermetean when you saw them and regularly seeded with isos it seems like you might be able to control/minimize them....
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