What are my hydra eating? (Hint: it's not BBS...)

[Jess]

I watched Cory's cool hydra video and thought to myself, "Huh...a creature that if you break it in half it grows into two wholes? I'd love to see some of those!"  As if the Aquarium Gods heard me, within a couple of days I noticed hydra in my tank, on the glass near my filter intake.  

The tank is cycled and has been running for almost two months.  Heavily planted, contains nothing but hitchhiker snails.  I don't put any food in the tank at all.  So what are the hydra eating?!

I did experience a bacteria bloom after I added plants and re-scaped the tank on Jan. 8th (cleaned a lot of debris from substrate and snail poo from broad-leaved plants, probably replaced about 90% of the water).  Are the hydra feasting on excess bacteria?

Not asking how to eradicate them...just curious what they are eating since in most posts folks are actively feeding their tanks micro live foods.

[Jack.of.all.aquariums]

I had plenty of hydra well before ever feeding baby brine. There are tons of microscopic organisms in an aquarium for them to feed one. Also there are green hydra that have some photosynthetic capabilities.

[Jess]

9 minutes ago, Jack.of.all.aquariums said:

I had plenty of hydra well before ever feeding baby brine. There are tons of microscopic organisms in an aquarium for them to feed one. Also there are green hydra that have some photosynthetic capabilities.

I wonder what all the microscopic organisms are... (again, for curiosity).  These hydra are green...so that's very interesting, indeed.  It's fun to wave my finger near them and watch them retract their little tentacles. Thanks for your comment!

EDIT: The tank in your cover photo is amazing!

Edited January 18, 2021 by Jess

[Jack.of.all.aquariums]

There are all sorts. I have a microscope so I can see them but don't know enough to be able to identify them all. If you looks up microscope pondwater on google you can find some images of things like paramecium, amoebas and plenty of other things.

[Jess]

13 minutes ago, Jack.of.all.aquariums said:

There are all sorts. I have a microscope so I can see them but don't know enough to be able to identify them all. If you looks up microscope pondwater on google you can find some images of things like paramecium, amoebas and plenty of other things.

Duh...I'm using rain water for my water changes.  OF COURSE there are paramecia, amoeba, etc. in there.  Why didn't I think of that?!  Especially since I spent many childhood afternoons searching for them with my kiddo microscope!  Maybe I need to dig that thing out again, for fun.  

[Daniel]

1 hour ago, Jess said:

I wonder what all the microscopic organisms are... (again, for curiosity).  These hydra are green...so that's very interesting, indeed.

This tank has hydra but no bbs. You can see the paramecium and stuff swimming around if you look close enough.

 

[Jess]

3 hours ago, Daniel said:

This tank has hydra but no bbs. You can see the paramecium and stuff swimming around

Wow, what a cool video!  Thank you for sharing that...it's really neat.