Please help strange parasite killing my shrimp one by one

[Fedorenko]

Okay so bit of a long story here... I recently ordered an anacharis plant online for my planted tank. The tank is a bit less than 5 gal has rcs, an oto and 3 neon tetras. I am very meticulous about the tank checking, and observing it daily with regular water checks and changes. I anchored my anacharis to a stone after giving it a nice rinse and plopped it into my tank and went to bed. Next morning I went to watch everyone swimming around, the fish were all great looking, but didn’t see any shrimps. This was instantly worrying to me,  I always see at least a couple shrimp hanging out on the grass or on the hydrocotyle plants, plus one of the females recently had babies and none were to be seen. After looking around the edges of the tank I began to find the adults they were all curled up and wedged in tight spaces. All but one adult was dead. I did some quick research online and people were saying they had this happen when putting in new plants because there was copper or pesticides on the plant which the shrimp are sensitive to. So I took the plant out and placed it into a tub of water and did a water change. I thought to myself “lesson learned, clean the plants thoroughly before adding them to the tank” but that wasnt the end of it. I went back to my tank to observe the last adult shrimp, and noticed a baby too. My hopes got up a bit and then I noticed something on my shrimps nose like a white speck. I did some more research and thought at first it was Scutariella. However after further observation I noticed this was definitely something else. This thing was moving around the shrimps rostrum quite a bit and I could see it was agitating the shrimp (took a video on my iphone but its too big to attach). It didnt seem to bother the shrimp to much at first but after checking back after a couple hours my shrimp was having seizures, twitching and looked so so distressed that it turned my stomach. I kept observing because I was having trouble finding anything even similar online. After some hours of torment the shrimp looked lifeless. And then it gets even WORSE, the baby that I saw earlier which was definitely free of any ecto parasites now had the same thing crawling on its rostrum. I fished out the dead adult with my net and sure enough there was no parasite to be found. I went to the local fish store and showed the guy some pictures and videos and he said he’d never seen anything like it. Has anyone else seen this thing before? Im thinking maybe the anacharis was grown in a lake and a parasite hitch hiked maybe? I’ll attach the best pictures and videos of it I was able to get. Some details I noticed: it has an antenna looking thing that it swings around kinda like Scutariella, but unlike Scutariella it moves around a lot, it seriously stresses its host and presumably kills them, and it will target both adult shrimp and babies. I picked up some kordon ich and parasite treatment from the fish store, if all my shrimp end up dying do you guys think this will wipe out these degenerates so it doesn't happen again? Thanks for any thoughts and answers!!!

the images and videos were too big to add to the post so I uploaded them to imgur for anyone whod like to see: https://m.imgur.com/a/CjQiCFW

[sdlTBfanUK]

So sorry that you are having this problem.

The nearest I came up with from the first video was possibly the Scutariella, but the other video looks a bit like it may be poisoning so I am baffled?  Are you sure it moves about and isn't anchored but swaying about? I don't believe you can rinse/wash off pesticides!

Which country are you from? It may be worth trying Seachem ParaGuard if you can get that where you are?

Did you get the plant from a business or privately?

How long has the tank been running successfully?

I hope someone may be able to help? I have had small white dots in my tank which run around (I assume they are seed shrimp but too small to see even with a magnifying glass) and they seem to make the shrimp very occasionally jump/twitch, and years ago I had tiny leeches when I sourced stuff from a lake, but neither attacked shrimps as you describe/show. It actually sounds more like it is predating the shrimp and when they die it goes for another??? Unless its actually not the critter but poisoning (from the plant assumedly) as shrimp are extremely sensitive to that?

Simon

[beanbag]

I think it is Scutariella or maybe "leech", as shown in this thread:

I have had those in the past too, and yes it wriggles quickly and yes it can easily detach and land somewhere else, and yes you can nuke it with a salt dip and no it is not killing your shrimp - something else is.

[Fedorenko]

3 hours ago, sdlTBfanUK said:

 

I live in the US, and I have seen Seachem ParaGuard thankyou for the suggestion. Ive had this tank for about a year now, but have had fish and shrimp for only 4-6 months. I ordered the plants from amazon and it had all great reviews for the most part and nobody mentioned their shrimp or fish being poisoned. As for the movement of this thing... it definitely moves, sometimes I thought it was gone, but had moved to another side of the rostrum. I was observing this thing for a while and I am almost certain it isn’t Scutariella, unless perhaps this is a less common species? Plus I felt as if the movement of this thing was disturbing the shrimp, see him flinching in the first vid? I don’t have much experience in the aquarium hobby, but I do taxonomy on insects irl, so I feel pretty confident in my observations. I could be wrong, but if anyone has any other ideas or possibilities that would be great I want to come to a solid conclusion on this thing. Thanks!

[jayc]

It's unlikely to be Scutariella. It's too "fat" to be that. More likely to be a leech, that is biting down to latch on, causing distress/flinching  to the shrimp.

In general, parasites and leeches, do not kill the host. It's not in their interest to kill the host, if it's food source is dead.

But there is always a first time for everything. A salt bath should work well on parasites, and it's relatively safe for shrimps.

But try to get a full water parameter test just to rule out other issues. Please report back with your water tests.

  The 2nd vid of the shrimp struggling is classic ammonia poisoning.

So please check ammonia, nitrites.

[sdlTBfanUK]

I had a thought yesterday, is that thing just a water mite? I had them once and they run over everything and I can imagine a shrimp trying to get it off! I don't think they are harmful though, just creepy!! As JayC says of the leeches, they don't kill the shrimps but I never saw one on a shrimp, they may stress a shrimp but as JayC says the struggling shrimp looks more like poisoning. It may be that the critter and the deaths are not connected but two completely separate issues?

Simon

[Fedorenko]

I think you guys are right about them being separate issues, but what a strange event of coincidences. I got home today and no shrimps are to be found anymore along with the mystery parasite. Fish all look great. I did a water test and the ph came to 7.2, ammonia was .15ppm, nitrite was 0 ppm and nitrate 0ppm. This was after the water change I did the other day so perhaps high ammonia levels got to them or how I was speculating originally there may have been pesticides on the plant I ordered. It wouldnt really make sense for a parasite to be killing all of its hosts. Id still love to try and figure out what the thing was though. I looked up water mites and I think it’s a possibilty, but idk if there are parasitic ones and this creature looked like it had a long antenna or probe like thing. Its hard trying to match stuff from just my low quality i phone vids. Thanks for the help and ideas!

[sdlTBfanUK]

Sorry to hear you have lost all the shrimps. If there were any dead ones still in the tank that may have caused the ammonia reading?

It would be worth trying the seachem paraguard if you can get some, while there aren't any shrimp! Then leave it a while before restocking to settle down, grow some biofilm etc! Most treatments need your filter media/carbon removed whilst using the treatment!

Simon

[beanbag]

12 hours ago, Fedorenko said:

 ammonia was .15ppm

yeah, that'll do it

[jayc]

On 3/9/2020 at 9:44 PM, Fedorenko said:

no shrimps are to be found anymore

Sorry to hear the news. 

 

Take the time now to let the tank mature and ammonia to be cycled into the less harmful Nitrates before adding new shrimp.

Edited March 11, 2020 by sdlTBfanUK

[Fedorenko]

Thanks for the tips. Im going to follow your recommendations and treat the tank for parasites while there aren't any invertebrates and let the ammonia get cycled out before I add any shrimp.

15 hours ago, sdlTBfanUK said:

Sorry to hear you have lost all the shrimps. If there were any dead ones still in the tank that may have caused the ammonia reading?

It would be worth trying the seachem paraguard if you can get some, while there aren't any shrimp! Then leave it a while before restocking to settle down, grow some biofilm etc! Most treatments need your filter media/carbon removed whilst using the treatment!

Simon

Simon, 

Thanks for all your replies. I was thinking the same thing, but I've been diligent with taking out dead adults. I think what caused it initially and lead to deaths was that the plant had many yellow and decaying leaves. I was previously ignorant of the fact that decaying plants release these toxins. I have a water lily in there too that produces many leaves that often disconnect and float around. Im going to start cleaning these dead and dying plant parts better.

Cheers!

[Amandalynn]

On 3/7/2020 at 4:19 PM, Fedorenko said:

Okay so bit of a long story here... I recently ordered an anacharis plant online for my planted tank. The tank is a bit less than 5 gal has rcs, an oto and 3 neon tetras. I am very meticulous about the tank checking, and observing it daily with regular water checks and changes. I anchored my anacharis to a stone after giving it a nice rinse and plopped it into my tank and went to bed. Next morning I went to watch everyone swimming around, the fish were all great looking, but didn’t see any shrimps. This was instantly worrying to me,  I always see at least a couple shrimp hanging out on the grass or on the hydrocotyle plants, plus one of the females recently had babies and none were to be seen. After looking around the edges of the tank I began to find the adults they were all curled up and wedged in tight spaces. All but one adult was dead. I did some quick research online and people were saying they had this happen when putting in new plants because there was copper or pesticides on the plant which the shrimp are sensitive to. So I took the plant out and placed it into a tub of water and did a water change. I thought to myself “lesson learned, clean the plants thoroughly before adding them to the tank” but that wasnt the end of it. I went back to my tank to observe the last adult shrimp, and noticed a baby too. My hopes got up a bit and then I noticed something on my shrimps nose like a white speck. I did some more research and thought at first it was Scutariella. However after further observation I noticed this was definitely something else. This thing was moving around the shrimps rostrum quite a bit and I could see it was agitating the shrimp (took a video on my iphone but its too big to attach). It didnt seem to bother the shrimp to much at first but after checking back after a couple hours my shrimp was having seizures, twitching and looked so so distressed that it turned my stomach. I kept observing because I was having trouble finding anything even similar online. After some hours of torment the shrimp looked lifeless. And then it gets even WORSE, the baby that I saw earlier which was definitely free of any ecto parasites now had the same thing crawling on its rostrum. I fished out the dead adult with my net and sure enough there was no parasite to be found. I went to the local fish store and showed the guy some pictures and videos and he said he’d never seen anything like it. Has anyone else seen this thing before? Im thinking maybe the anacharis was grown in a lake and a parasite hitch hiked maybe? I’ll attach the best pictures and videos of it I was able to get. Some details I noticed: it has an antenna looking thing that it swings around kinda like Scutariella, but unlike Scutariella it moves around a lot, it seriously stresses its host and presumably kills them, and it will target both adult shrimp and babies. I picked up some kordon ich and parasite treatment from the fish store, if all my shrimp end up dying do you guys think this will wipe out these degenerates so it doesn't happen again? Thanks for any thoughts and answers!!!

the images and videos were too big to add to the post so I uploaded them to imgur for anyone whod like to see: https://m.imgur.com/a/CjQiCFW

Hi, you may not need any more advise on this as it's been a mo th, but I'd be interested in seeing the video if u still have it. I downloaded a photo compressor to attach my photos, I'm sure there are video and file compressor apps too. Let me know if ur able to upload that video, I'd be interested to see what it is and looks like

[Amandalynn]

On 3/8/2020 at 8:02 AM, Fedorenko said:

I live in the US, and I have seen Seachem ParaGuard thankyou for the suggestion. Ive had this tank for about a year now, but have had fish and shrimp for only 4-6 months. I ordered the plants from amazon and it had all great reviews for the most part and nobody mentioned their shrimp or fish being poisoned. As for the movement of this thing... it definitely moves, sometimes I thought it was gone, but had moved to another side of the rostrum. I was observing this thing for a while and I am almost certain it isn’t Scutariella, unless perhaps this is a less common species? Plus I felt as if the movement of this thing was disturbing the shrimp, see him flinching in the first vid? I don’t have much experience in the aquarium hobby, but I do taxonomy on insects irl, so I feel pretty confident in my observations. I could be wrong, but if anyone has any other ideas or possibilities that would be great I want to come to a solid conclusion on this thing. Thanks!

Sorry... I missed that u uploaded it to a site. I'll check that out. Have a good day. Sorry about that!