# Help! Worms are eating my shrimp!!!



## Yukina (Sep 12, 2015)

Help! 
There are worms eating my shrimp! I checked my berried blue velvet shrimp to see how she was doing and she was perfectly fine. 
So I went for a walk and came back an hour later and I found her dead with these weird white worms all over her! There’s also a weird orange spot on her head. 

Is there anything I can do to get rid of these worms and help the other shrimp? I don’t know if they’re in the other shrimp too...

It’s right near her eggs, the rest have crawled inside her.

The one on the rock is one of the ones that just crawled out of her


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## VElderton (Jun 3, 2015)

FYI: Thanks to your picture the weird "orange" worm shown is a flatworm - Planaria. These are common and naturally occur in many freshwater streams in the Lower Mainland. In that situation they are scavengers, living under rocks and the fine detritus of streams. I have never known them to be predators.

I have no idea what the white worms are ... I am suspicious that either caused your shrimp to die.

I have no experience with shrimp but my sense is you feed them fine grain small food, easy to digest. This is exactly the kind of food a number of worms, including Planaria would thrive on. If it was me I would use dwarf corydoras - Habrosas in the tank for clean-up but my guess these would eat shrimplets. 

I will let shrimp experts way-in on solution to your issues.

Hope this helps


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## barvinok (Nov 20, 2011)

As VElderton said planarias are scavengers and will not eat healthy live shrimp.
In a shrimp tank they are usually the sign of overfeeding.
Hard to tell what the other warms are. If they have triangular heads they are also planarias.
You can remove planarias with the turkey baster, make sure not to squish them as they can regrow from tiny pieces


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## kivyee (Oct 15, 2016)

From my readings planaria can attack shrimp and even fish! I would look into dosing with No planaria especially if you are keeping more expensive shrimp.


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## TomC (Apr 21, 2010)

The first picture looks like nematodes. They are harmless. The second looks like a planaria. Probably neither killed your shrimp.


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## kivyee (Oct 15, 2016)

Just FYI
https://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showthread.php?t=406466
And
http://www.aquaticquotient.com/forum/showthread.php/46147-Planaria-attacking-cherry-shrimps

Looks like people have witnessed planaria attacks...If it were me I wouldn't take the chance...


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## Reckon (Jul 25, 2012)

In my tank - the shrimp EAT planaria.














JK! No, actually they live quite peacefully with each other.


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