# What are these...... Parasites?



## TIGGER (Jan 17, 2006)

I went ice fishing this morning and caught a nice batch of bluegills at Aquilla lake. I put the fish in a small cooler with water. When I got home and let them go in my pond I noticed this in the bottom on the cooler after I dumped the water out. I just thought they were scales. I went to rinse them out and they were moving around.
























They look just like fish scales and are fairly large.












I was able to zoom in on the photo shop program. I did a search on water parasites but have not found them yet. They are not Fluke Worms. Does anybody know what these are? I will look next time I fish there to see where they are on the fish.


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## FISHIN 2 (Jun 22, 2005)

Looks kind of like a water flea. Get em on line trolling thick sometimes. Might be what it is, not 100 % sure though. Mike


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## Jigging Jim (Apr 3, 2010)

TIGGER said:


> I went ice fishing this morning and caught a nice batch of bluegills at Aquilla lake. I put the fish in a small cooler with water. When I got home and let them go in my pond I noticed this in the bottom on the cooler after I dumped the water out. I just thought they were scales. I went to rinse them out and they were moving around.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


 :F Perhaps this is one of the reasons why the ODNR does not want us to dump fish from one body of water into another...


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## firstflight111 (May 22, 2008)

never seen them before


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## yonderfishin (Apr 9, 2006)

Just guessing , but because of the forked tail like appendage it looks like..........



Argulus is a crustacean, of the class Branchiura. These parasites are found on the skin and gills of fish. Argulus feed by inserting a pre-oral stylet into the skin that injects digestive enzymes, which break-down proteins, allowing the parasite to suck out body fluids. The spines, suckers, and hooks argulus use for attachment cause further irritation. Argulus infestation can cause focal, red lesions on the body of the fish.


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## fish master (Dec 24, 2005)

this might be it.. 
Branchiura, commonly called carp lice or fish lice are a group of parasitic crustaceans of uncertain position within the Maxillopoda. Although they are thought to be primitive forms, they have no fossil record. Almost all are ectoparasites on fish, a few on amphibians. www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fish_louse


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## phishyone1 (Jun 27, 2008)

Never seen those before... Hope they dont effect your pond you put them in.....


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## freyedknot (Apr 10, 2004)

Bedbugs, they are everywhere


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## Bluefinn (Jan 26, 2007)

Bedbugs, That's funny.


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## overcheck (Dec 13, 2010)

Do you swim in your pond or use it for drinking water?


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## TIGGER (Jan 17, 2006)

Those sure look the same! Interesting............ Aquilla lake is almost the start of the East Branch of the Cuyahoga river. It is about the size of Tinkers Creek as it works its way down South towards Mantua.

The only other thing that could have happened was that I bought some fathead minnows last weekend. I kept them in the same cooler. I had them in the garage and unfortunately skim ice formed. All the minnows died and I dumped them into the woods.......... it was dark out. I didn't look in the bottom of the cooler and just stuck in the garage with the lid inserted sideways. There was still a thin layer of water in the bottom. I just grabbed the cooler on the way out this morning. They may have been in there already. They may have let loose of the minnows when they died and dropped to the bottom. That may explain why there are so many of them. They are like stuck to the bottom. It was hard to get one out for the pictures. I could see them staying in the cooler after the quick dump of the dead minnows. I put the bluegills in thru a drilled hole in my pond one at a time. I just dumped the water on top of the ice. The cooler was upside down while I got two bluegills to swim down the hole. I took the pictures after I got back to the house. They didn't come out on the dump. 

If that was the case who knows how many would end up in all fishable lakes just from buying bait? I am not going to say where I bought the minnows but they all come from the same source. I will check next weekend when I go back to catch some more. We will know the answer then.


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## Gobi Muncher (May 27, 2004)

Fish Louse?


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## Eugene (Jun 23, 2004)

Sure looks like some species of fish louse to me.


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## tomb (Oct 9, 2004)

I'd go with fish lice too. Check under the gill covers, John. They'll be easily visible.


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## jiggin'fool (Dec 18, 2005)

fished aquilla about 9 years ago and the guy I was fishing with pulled up a gill and some weeds and found some of those on the weeds... he called me over and said if you find any of these use them for bait... it was a kind of slow day but he put it on his hook and immediately caught bluegills... I then caught a gill that had one on it and took it off put it on my hook and caught six in a row before I lost it.... after that I drilled holes shallow in the weeds just so I could find some... found a couple more and started catching fish again... never would have believed it if I wouldn't have done it!


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## glbags (May 7, 2009)

Bedbugs!!! LOL


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## creekcrawler (Oct 5, 2004)

Definitely a black crappie.


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## Shortdrift (Apr 5, 2004)

if you didn't have them in your pond before, you have them now.


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## jonnythfisherteen2 (Mar 5, 2011)

the main question is, are they still edible? are they safe to handle?


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## Saugeye Tom (Oct 6, 2010)

they look like baby stingrays lol


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