Possible parasites: anyone have an answer?

[chubbydog811]

My fish are not doing well in one of my tanks. One has been doing the crazy spinning around, then swimming off...He died. Next was my silver dollar - no real signs with him, he just died, can't say much more!...
They have one of those long air stones, filter was just cleaned, the tank has some algae, but not bad.

I went to scoop out the dead silver dollar, and noticed MANY tiny bugs on the top, that were hopping around on the surface of the water. They look brown ish...Too small for my eyes to see clearly. In all the years I have had a tank, I have never seen this!

Any ideas on what they are, and how to get rid of them? Is this potentially why my fish are dying? These weren't there when I cleaned the tank last week, and the fish in this particular tank were all healthy last week as well.

Any help would be appreciated! Thanks!

 

[jsoong]

I think that chances of those bugs being parasites are small. Parasites are normally not free living, but attached to the fish. You are more likely to find the cause of your fish death by examining the dead fish closely for any parasites on the skin, gills or in the gut.

The bugs at the water surface are likely insect larvae ... maybe no-see-um's (a small whitefly) ... commonly found in houseplants & sometimes will reproduce in your tanks. <I had them once ... but the goldies just snack on them.> But to really ID the bugs, you would have to catch one & look under a microscope or a magnifier glass.