[thendeathsaid]

One of my bettas is in a 4 gallon filtered tank, bare bottom, one anubias nana, some wisteria floating and a part of an indian almond leaf. The walls are quite literally covered with planaria



It's worse in some other parts but I couldn't get a clear shot.

I know planaria is a sign of overfeeding and a lot of decaying matter in the tank, but as the tank is bare bottomed I can see there's no decaying matter other than bits of my betta's poop, and I only feed my betta enough to get his belly rounded, and he always eats all of it. I change the water every 3 days, around 30%. So idk why there are so many.... and how can I get rid of them without doing a 100% water change and scrubbing everything?

 

[shellieca]

It takes time for them to go away. Try feeding once a day or every other day, it won't hurt your Betta. I wouldn't worry too much about them, to my knowledge they are harmless. All of my tanks went through this a some point, how old is the tank? Oh, have you checked your nitrAtes? I seem to recall there being a corelation with high nitrates but I'm not certain.

 

[thendeathsaid]

I'll try once a day for now, and if it doesn't go away soon then every other day. This tank's around...3 weeks old? Most of my tanks have gone through planaria too but it's never been so bad before, even though some definitely had more decaying organic matter than this one @[email protected] I just checked the nitrates; they're either 10 ppm or 20 ppm (I can't tell the difference on API's little colour chart xD).

 

[shellieca]

Some of my tanks were worse than others also, didn't seem to be much rhyme or reason to it. The nitrAtes are obviously good

 

[thendeathsaid]

Okay, I suppose if it's unpredictable it can't be helped xD Thanks for the help!

 

[mart]

I had some in my tank before. I just started doing 50% water changes daily until they were gone.
Those are actually Detritus Worms, not Planaria.
http://www.fish-as-pets.com/2007/11/planaria-detritus-internet-answers.html

 

[thendeathsaid]

Oh cool, thanks for the info!

 

[taquitos]

Hmmm not to hijack this thread, but my ~1 month old tank has worms or planaria or whatever as well.

Only problem is that it is a planted tank with sand substrate, therefore harder to keep clean... Any suggestions on what I can do?

 

[shellieca]

Gently swirl the water causing most of the detris to float up & you can vac it out. Cut back on feeding frequency to also help.