Little White Spec Swimming in My Tank

[John Collins]

I have a five gallon tank with a betta, a nerite snail, and now a little white spec that I saw swimming around. Any idea of what it might be. It looked to be about the size of the period at the end of this sentence.

[Chrisdis]

A picture of it might help. 

[John Collins]

I can't get a picture of it, it's two small for autofocus to focus in on.

 

[Jollypop4321]

You didn’t specify if the white spot was swimming in the water column or mostly on the bottom near or in the substrate.   
I had something similar that turned out to be scuds that took up residents in the substrate.  The eggs came in on a mat of dwarf hair grass and hatched in my aquarium.  
Scuds are amphipods that are shrimp like    A good source of food for some fish.   

[Daniel]

Could be cyclops or seed shrimp?

Here is a video I shot that has, seed shrimp, cyclops and scuds in it.

 

[gardenman]

If it's very, very small it could be infusoria. What is infusoria? They're small, microscopic, or nearly microscopic life forms in water. They can be algae, amoebas, euglena, paramecium, rotifers, stentor, vorticella, etc.. Daphnia is another possibility if it's a tiny bit bigger. Our tanks are not sterile, lifeless vats of water. They're teeming with life, but most of the life that's big enough to see gets filtered out or eaten before we see it. I keep two breeder boxes up and running on my tanks (largely so I don't have to remember where the heck I put them when I need them.) They have a slow flow of tank water through them and they're teeming with life. All kinds of little moving specks of something are in there swimming, floating, and jerking their way around. Detritus worms line the walls. It's pretty neat to see what lives in a relatively stagnant part of your aquarium where fish can't eat them. I let them grow and spawn in there and know they'll be there to feed any fry that end up in the breeder box. It's pretty impressive the amount of life that can develop in a simple breeder box hanging on the side of the tank. Some would say the breeder boxes are ugly as they have lots of algae, but I just let them be and watch everything that goes on inside them. I don't see any of that in the big tank due to the filtration and fish, but in the breeder boxes all kinds of life survives and thrives. At least until I put some hungry fry in. Then it all becomes food for the fry.

[John Collins]

47 minutes ago, Daniel said:

Could be cyclops or seed shrimp?

Here is a video I shot that has, seed shrimp, cyclops and scuds in it.

 

That's what I saw. Thank you! I assume it's nothing to be alarmed about.

 

 

[John Collins]

13 minutes ago, gardenman said:

If it's very, very small it could be infusoria. What is infusoria? They're small, microscopic, or nearly microscopic life forms in water. They can be algae, amoebas, euglena, paramecium, rotifers, stentor, vorticella, etc.. Daphnia is another possibility if it's a tiny bit bigger. Our tanks are not sterile, lifeless vats of water. They're teeming with life, but most of the life that's big enough to see gets filtered out or eaten before we see it. I keep two breeder boxes up and running on my tanks (largely so I don't have to remember where the heck I put them when I need them.) They have a slow flow of tank water through them and they're teeming with life. All kinds of little moving specks of something are in there swimming, floating, and jerking their way around. Detritus worms line the walls. It's pretty neat to see what lives in a relatively stagnant part of your aquarium where fish can't eat them. I let them grow and spawn in there and know they'll be there to feed any fry that end up in the breeder box. It's pretty impressive the amount of life that can develop in a simple breeder box hanging on the side of the tank. Some would say the breeder boxes are ugly as they have lots of algae, but I just let them be and watch everything that goes on inside them. I don't see any of that in the big tank due to the filtration and fish, but in the breeder boxes all kinds of life survives and thrives. At least until I put some hungry fry in. Then it all becomes food for the fry.

That sounds right. Thank you for the reminder to sit tight, not panic, and just enjoy the beauty!

 

[John Collins]

10 hours ago, Jollypop4321 said:

You didn’t specify if the white spot was swimming in the water column or mostly on the bottom near or in the substrate.   
I had something similar that turned out to be scuds that took up residents in the substrate.  The eggs came in on a mat of dwarf hair grass and hatched in my aquarium.  
Scuds are amphipods that are shrimp like    A good source of food for some fish.   

It was int he water column, but I had just stirred things up. I looked up scuds. Thank you for your help.

[Daniel]

Just now, John Collins said:

That's what I saw. Thank you! I assume it's nothing to be alarmed about.

 

 

Nothing to worried about at all! Like @gardenman says above, it is just all the little microscopic fauna that really healthy aquariums have. It is actually a very good sign.

[CalmedByFish]

On 3/14/2021 at 8:00 AM, Daniel said:

little microscopic fauna that really healthy aquariums have

Is there a way to get these on purpose? I've seen scuds for sale, but no other species of tiny critter.