tiny white things in my rcs breedig tank

[teacher]

Does anyone know what the tiny, almost microscopic white specs are swimming aroud the glass of my 5g rcs breeding tank. Iv'e read @ cyclopse ???? , water fleas??? , mesquito larva?? As you can see I am confused. My water perapeters are all good. We are molting and have had 2 batches of babies, Two other females are berried. What are the white things, how do I get rid of tehm and are they dangerous to my shrimp?

Teacher

[milalic]

Does anyone know what the tiny, almost microscopic white specs are swimming aroud the glass of my 5g rcs breeding tank. Iv'e read @ cyclopse ???? , water fleas??? , mesquito larva?? As you can see I am confused. My water perapeters are all good. We are molting and have had 2 batches of babies, Two other females are berried. What are the white things, how do I get rid of tehm and are they dangerous to my shrimp?

Teacher

Do the white things look like a worm? There are different types of white things with different shape in the tank that you will see. Most of them will not harm the shrimp.

-Pedro

[YuccaPatrol]

If they are cyclops, they are a great natural indicator of high quality water conditions for keeping shrimp. They indicate that your water is generally low in toxic compounds and also indicate that you have a thriving community of micro-organisms which are the main food source for your shrimp.

When I don't see these in my tanks, I immediately get out my test kit to see if something has gone wrong.

They will either appear teardrop shaped or may be carrying two little bags of eggs.

They could be a great example for your students to show how every ecosystem is composed of many different interdependent organisms and to demonstrate a basic food chain/web in your aquarium

[Mustafa]

The only thing I have found out recently about copepods is that they can take huge concentrations of ammonia without a problem. I was "re-cycling" a tank (fishless) and even after putting in 4 ppm of ammonia, the copepods were zipping around undeterred. High nitrates and a high dissolved organic load does them in, though.

[Neonshrimp]

I guess if you have them you just have to feed less and hope that they disappear from hunger

[YuccaPatrol]

Interesting note about the ammonia tolerance, Mustafa.

I've noticed them disappear on a couple occasions when nitrate level has been higher than I like to see.

[teacher]

tHEY ARE SO TINY THAT IT IS HARD TO TELL THEIR SHAPE. SOME LOOK LONGER OTHERS SEEM ROUND OR MORE OVAL SHAPED. tHEY HANG AROUND THE SPONGE FILTER. I HAVE NOTICED THEM MOVING IN AND OUT OF THE POURS OF THE SPONGE FILTER. i GUESS I WILL NEED TO GET A MAGNIFYING GLASS TO SEE IF THEY LOOK LIKE THE PICTURE.
mOST OF THE TIME THEY CRAWL ON THE GLASS OF SPONGE. I HAVE NOT DONE MUCH FEEDING DUE THE ALGAE SUPPLY IN THE TANK. IVE BROKEN UP AN ALGAE WAFER IN SMALL PIECES AND FED IT. iT HAS LASTED ABOUT A MONTH.

[Mustafa]

"teacher,"

Please stop typing in all capital letters. It's considered shouting on the internet and is generally not desired anywhere.

Plus...this topic clearly belongs to the "other invertebrates" forum...I missed this earlier. Hence, the topic will be transferred there.

[TKD]

I think she had caps on by accident because if you look at the fist letter of each sentence it is in lower caps...

TKD

[Mustafa]

Accident or not...I hope everyone actually looks at their postings before submitting them to notice anything weird.

[teacher]

Lighten up. My concern was the safety of my shrimp not being politically correct. Excuse the shouting. Nothing was meant by it just a typo as someone indicated. I have read the article on shrimp dying. If I could have figured out the answer from the articles then I would not have asked the question.

I got another test kit and the amonia is 0ppm, nitrite is 0ppm and nitrate is 0ppm-5ppm. The water change was done with the same bottle water I always use.

Excuse the comment Mustafa but courtesy goes both ways. If I responed to my students honest questions the way you responded to mine then they would never ask another question and the education process would stop.

Thanks to all of you who have been kind and tried to help me! May you be repaid with the same kindness.

Teacher

[YuccaPatrol]

I had one idea. Is there any chance that the algae sponge you used might have accidentally been used for something else? Considering that your nitrogenous waste levels seem good and you are using clean bottled water, the only other thing that you have put in your tank was that sponge.

[Mustafa]

Lighten up.

No, I won't lighten up. Your very first post here was a blatant rule violation when you decided to ask people to send you shrimp. Obviously someone decided to send you shrimp after reading your post (and before I could delete it). Then you violated the rules again with your second question in this forum by not doing the research and asking questions that have been asked a million times before and to which answers can be found all over the website and forum. I closed both eyes that time and let you continue. Now you're using this forum as a helpline and criticize the owner of this website and the way he responds to your question because he does not give you "warm and fuzzy" replies full of "kindness."

And of course that way you're breaking the rules *once again* by telling me how to reply to people's posts. You might want to read the rules again, just like I told you to read the articles again. There is always a reason behind my comments. I don't just sit here and try to make people uncomfortable. And I also don't try to create a warm and fuzzy atmosphere so the discussions can focus on the facts. We can only efficiently help someone who can actually provide some kind of history/data about their tank and what they have been doing. Everything else is just speculation and won't help anyone. Might as well play the lottery. Asking something along the lines of "I have white critters and I think they might be killing my shrimp. What's wrong??? Please help???" as you did in your other thread (after I moved this one into this forum) does not give anyone anything tangible to work with. I don't expect you to understand this but to efficiently solve a problem you need to narrow it down *yourself* first, using all the data in the articles and thousands of posts here, and *then* ask others about their opinions *after* you narrow it down. Look at it as self-directed research with "peer" review.

And as for your constant blabber about being a teacher....all I am going to say is that I hope for the sake of the students that you are not teaching English....

Anyway....topic (and the other thread in the shrimp forum) closed, ban of *repeat*, *multiple* offender implemented.