Planaria treatment- Two cents???

When I treated my tanks I dosed about 4 days in a row then did water changes over 2-3 days.

Does the trick.

Depending on substrate depth in your tank the little buggers can burrow down deep. You may need to repeat treatment.

Once treated always treat anything new coming into your tank.

-Gordon

No shrimp issues I guess? How big were your water changes?

Am I jumping the gun or should I go ahead and eradicate the planaria?

I would say go ahead and treat. Then after a week or so run a filter with purigen and gravel vac to clear it out the tank.

I am only running two sponge filters and there is no way I could gravel vac it. There are easily over 100 small shrimp with more hatching every few days. I think all I can do is water changes.

What kind of water change schedule did you do after treatment? I can't do a gravel vac or run carbon since there are only sponge filters.

I waited a few days after I didn't see planaria in the morning. Which only took 1 night for me. I turned out the lights then waited a few hours till the planaria came out then I dosed the tank. Then out went the lights again. In the morning I checked and there weren't any on the tank sides. Then in like 2-3 days I did a water change.

Hey Rod, What did you purchase? I've been looking for the Fenbendazole but haven't had any luck

rodcuda said:

Am I jumping the gun or should I go ahead and eradicate the planaria?

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Kind of curious, why the need to eradicate the hapless planarians, they are quite harmless are they not?

Oh wow. I've never heard of this. I would of assumed it would be the other way around but that shrimp does appear to be under siege. :\

Michael M said:

Oh wow. I've never heard of this. I would of assumed it would be the other way around but that shrimp does appear to be under siege. :\

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There are videos on Youtube of shrimp being attacked and killed by them. It might be more rare than common but still not something I'd want to have happen in my tanks.

ghost shrimp said:

Hey Rod, What did you purchase? I've been looking for the Fenbendazole but haven't had any luck

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Panacur and Safeguard are brand names. Easy to find in any local Co-op farm type store, TSC, Walmart, Petsmart, etc.

As for your shrimps safety, I have dosed this stuff and had the shrimp eat the undissolved granules and it didnt hurt them so its pretty shrimp safe. It does work good, but as mentioned, I would treat a week apart, because some will be in your substrate and unaffected by it.

I dosed my tank last night. Could not see any before dosing, but very quickly I spotted a couple. This morning I found a couple on the glass below the gravel line, they were not dead but very inactive. So I think 1 dose is going to do it, but I have not decided for sure.

But remember that I did not have many anyway. I did see one dead shrimp this morning which is the first dead shrimp I have seen in that tank since I put shrimp in 2 months ago. That doesn't mean there have not been dead ones I never saw but I doubt it as the adult population has been stable and the population of young shrimp booming.

All the little shrimp, even day old ones seem to be fine and all are acting normal.

I bought Safegaurd which had three 1 mg packages, so each package is good for 10 treatments.

So I have 2 packages if anyone needs them. I would sell them at cost as I don't expect to use up 10 doses anythime soon.

Looks like I will do a second dose, still found a couple over the last 24 hours. Very inactive but alive. All the shrimp seem to be fine.

Any one know what the half life is on the Fenbendazole in water?

Personally I would wait for a day or so before dosing anymore.

It has been 48 hours, I was going to dose again tommorow night at the 72 hour mark.

Sounds good. Are the planria moving around that you can see? I would turn off the lights wait a few hours then see if more come out.