Leeches

[Kris]

Does anyone know how to cut the leech population down in the parts of the pond that are not inhabited by fish?  I was wading in my stream last night & came out with about 40-50 small clear leeches on my feet.  I'd like to either get rid of them of at least cut down the population.  I don't have any in the main pond where the koi are.

[tinkster]

I have no idea but the vision of leeches on my feet just ewwwww....

[bunny56lbc]

Salt?

[Jonna]

yeah, I've got the major creeps from thinking about it.  I don't know that I'd ever go in the pond again.   Are leeches common there?  How did they get in the pond?  Argh!

[Holldoll]

Is this a man made pond? If so, how did the leeches get there? I don't have them in my pond. Makes me sick thinking about it though!

[turtlemike]

   I don't know how to get rid of them but I can tell you what I do know. If the forty or fifty small leaches that you had on your feet were all the same size and located in roughly the same area on your feet then you came in contact with a big mother leach with a belly covered with a bunch of babies. They Carry them around on there belly's and when they sense you nearby they swim over to you and latch on for just a second. They give a signal to the babies to leave mom and go to the food source at which time the babies explode from there mothers belly like an expanding cloud, and then they head for you and latch on. And mom swims away.
   You can find a leach with babies, attached to something and approach it with your finger and the mother will signal the babies to leave her when she senses that you are right there, and then when you pull away the cloud of baby leaches swim right back to mom.  I know that the babies are not leaving mom in response to my presence because they don't swim toward me when the cloud expands, just outward, away from mom and then back if they don't run into you. or get close enough to sense you.

     I don't encounter leaches in my ponds except in one place , and that's where my turtles bask. The turtles bring the few leaches that there are in the pond to the basking area and the leaches fall off the turtles and stay there. Then I go over and catch them , or they catch me, kind of a little of both, and I throw them out of the pond where they dry and die. I put them in a lily bud and throw it otherwise it's hard to throw them they're very clingy.

  So this is a long round about way of saying that you might not have a whole lot of leaches, just a big one that had a lot of babies to deposit on you.
   The way to get the baby leaches off of you is to rub them off with a dry towel or rag.  Dry is death to a leach and a dry towel is the last thing a leach wants to see. if they could see.  It dries them out and rubs them off and they can't cling to it and fall off.
 
   So maybe the best way to reduce your leach population is to do what I do. Which is to catch them by letting them think they are catching me and then dispose of them.  With the help from my turtles I keep a half acre pond nearly leach free this way.

[Bullfrog]

Put speakers by your pond and play Barry Manilow music, the leeches will leave.

[Joyce]

I'd like to see pix of these leeches.
Never heard of 'clear' leeches.
I think it may be something else.

[Freddie Peepers]

I agree with Joyce.
Never heard of "clear " leeches
Probably some sort of larvae that laid eggs in the pond water
I'm surprised the fish haven't eaten them

[Lori]

I had a customer bring in a lily leaf in a ziplock bag this spring. It was eaten in a lacy pattern but he could find no insects. He also said the leaves were perfect until they reached the surface, then they were became "fillagreed". I found a couple miniscule clear worms in the bag.  He had lost all his fish the previous winter.  Obviously the worms were attacking the leaf when it surfaced.  Someone my son talked to called them glass worms.  Anyone heard of them?  A very knowledgable friend told me they were a problem simply because there were no fish to keep them under control.  Kind of sounds  like this problem.  I thought the same thing as Joyce when I first read the post- Clear?  Probably not leeches.  That's all I know.
The leech info is very interesting.  I learned something new!
                                          

[frogman3]

I have never heard of clear leaches either.
I was watching a program the other night and the guy was purposely walking through the underbrush of a jungle to show how the leaches could sense the change of light intensity from a passing animal and reach out from the leaves to attach them selves to you. He squeezed a lemon on the leach and the juice caused the leach to fall right off. Not sure though how the lemon juice felt in the bloody cut on his belly!

[turtlemike]

  These very small leaches are very clear, translucent to be more precise.  Also a slight tan color. No more than 3 to six mm. long when stretched out.  Sounds like leaches to me. If you leave them on you for a while they turn red.

[PondmaninAL]

I've seen the clear/translucent leeches. They are harmless. They eat the debris on the bottom of the pond.

[miguynmkoi]

I all I can say is GROSSSSSS!!!!! 

[PondmaninAL]

Put speakers by your pond and play Barry Manilow music, the leeches will leave.

Oh Bullfrog? Do you remember what I said? As soon as I figure out how to get music to play on my signature, you will be tormented. (Insert evil laugh here)


 

[Bullfrog]

Note to Bullfrog: Turn speakers off.

[Kris]

We do have leeches like these in the Fox River up by me in Illinois.  I figure the birds brought them in!!!!   I think the fish must eat them in the main pond because I only have them in the stream & the small upper pond (the 2 places with no fish).  They are all about the 3-6mm length & probably are a slight tan color - I can see right through them pretty much because they're so small.  Were they get on you is on the bottom of the pond or stream - mainly when I was splitting plants so I'm disturbing the bottom & probably bringing them up while I'm doing it.  I'm thinking I just need to do a good clean out of the top pond & stream anyway along with a Sodium Percarbonate treatment for the string algae in the stream & that should knock the population down quite a bit.  They don't really bother me when they're in small numbers - it just seems like I had a population explosion this year!