Does this worm live in your pitchers?

[Zhilin]

Recently I noticed some worms seem to live in some pitchers of my N. glabrata. The worm is about 1-2cm long, and very thin, like a thread.

Here is the pic. Does any one have any idea about what is this? How to kill them?

Thanks

 

[mass]

mosquito larva? Never seen them out of water..

 

[Zhilin]

No, not the mosquito larva. It is much thinner and longer than the larva. And it is live just above the water in the pitchers (I am not sure whether the worm can enter the water, I just saw them on the pitcher inside wall above the water).

 

[Andyscoolsn]

http://www.carnivorousplants.org/howto/Pests/FungusGnatLarvae.php

maybe it's that? just a suggestion.

 

[Zhilin]

No. The fungus gnat larvae is too shorter than what I posted. Mine can be 2 cm long, and very thin. It's black. No body saw this worm?

http://www.carnivorousplants.org/howto/Pests/FungusGnatLarvae.php

maybe it's that? just a suggestion.

 

[swords]

I have some predatory worms in my Anole vivarum called Nemerteans (not Nematodes). Here's about the only site discussing them, there is a video as well. Sometimes the video loads sometimes not.

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/alan.cann/articles/nemerteans.html

I don't know if this is what you have, do your worms wave their heads about as if "sniffing" or searching for something? If so then they are probably a form of Nemertean

 

[Zhilin]

Thanks, swords. Probably it is the worm. But I cannot open that video. This morning I spent 3 hours to completely clean my HL terrarium and checked each pitcher of my plants. Fortunately I didn't find any more. I pruned all the old pitchers and only leave the freshly opened pitchers. And replaced all the moss, followed by spraying insecticide. Hope I will never see these worms again.

 

[swords]

For some reason the video loads today but I know it didn't the other day when I posted the link... LOL

Mine are just like in the video. On the site the guy says the only way to get rid of them is to junk the plants, soil and bleach out the tank. This isn't feasible when the plants are very expensive and rare but the good thing is the worms are carnivorous to springtails and dead feeders so other than being weird they don't really hurt anything in a plants only tank other than your peace of mind knowing they're in there.

 

[Zhilin]

I finally opened that video today. The shape of the worm I caught is similar to those shown in the video except the color. But its movement is completely different to those in the video. Its movement is very similar to the movement of snails (but totally different to snails, of course). I saw the worms in that video are very active, moving here and there. But the worm I caught moves slowly. When I first saw it on a pitcher, I even thought it was a segment of the moss or some dirt. When I observed it closely, then I found it slowly moved. I late found it can be killed by my insecticide when I dropped some insecticide liquid on it. Seems the worm still cannot be identified. But very thank you for your help.

For some reason the video loads today but I know it didn't the other day when I posted the link... LOL

Mine are just like in the video. On the site the guy says the only way to get rid of them is to junk the plants, soil and bleach out the tank. This isn't feasible when the plants are very expensive and rare but the good thing is the worms are carnivorous to springtails and dead feeders so other than being weird they don't really hurt anything in a plants only tank other than your peace of mind knowing they're in there.

 

[swords]

No problem, the video really does help ID if you have these specific worms since their movement is so distinctive.

Perhaps yours is a slug of some kind if it moves like a snail? You can try putting a shallow bottle cap of beer with a penny in it or other piece of copper into your terrarium and if there's slugs they will get attracted to the beer and then die of copper poisoning while at the cap drinking.