CATDOLL : CATDOLL: The difference between water centipedes and centipedes

The difference between water centipede and centipede

Water centipedes are plants, while centipedes are prolate arthropod carnivores, and that is the main difference.

The water centipede is a plant, a perennial herb that grows in clusters. The whole plant is smooth and hairless, and has a fragrance similar to calamus when fresh. The rhizome is weak and crawls flat on the ground; it looks like a centipede, with many nodes, many fibrous roots under the nodes, and a small seedling on each node.

Centipedes are long, flat arthropod carnivores with a pair of legs on each segment. They originated in the Silurian Period and there are still 2,800 species alive today. Like arthropods, they are well-known for having multiple arthropods.

Control technology of leech's natural enemies

Leeches swim slowly, live on land and water, and have underdeveloped vision. They don't know how to avoid enemies, so they have many enemies. The prevention and control of leech's natural enemies is an issue that must be taken seriously in leech farming. So how should we prevent and control leech's natural enemies? Let me take you to learn more about it.

Control technology of leeches' natural enemies The natural enemies of leeches mainly include mice, snakes, ants, water centipedes and other animals.

1. Rats

Rats are the main natural enemy of leeches and often swallow large numbers of leeches. Especially when leeches are active on the shore, they lose their ability to defend themselves and are eaten by rats.

Prevention and treatment methods

Method 1: Seal the breeding pond and reinforce escape-proof facilities around it to prevent rats from entering.

Method 2: Sprinkle rat poison around the pond, set mousetraps, and install electric mousetraps.

Method three: You can keep a cat because cats don’t eat leeches.

2. Ants

The reason for the appearance of ants is the introduction of the smell of bait or the introduction of bait from the soil. Ants mainly harm leeches and egg cocoons that are laying eggs.

Prevention and treatment methods

Method 1: Soil disinfection. You can use high temperature or sun exposure, or use Baidusha to kill ant eggs.

Method 2: Sprinkle trichlorobenzene and other pesticides around the anti-escape net.

Method 3: Mix chlordane powder with the clay outside the escape-proof net to prevent ants from entering.

3. Snakes and water centipedes

Snakes and water centipedes can sometimes ingest leeches.

Prevention and control methods: Use sticks and fish nets to remove snakes from the pond, and reinforce the escape-proof net to prevent snakes from entering. Install iron nets and nylon nets at the water inlet to prevent water centipedes from entering the pond with the water.

Five methods to prevent and control the natural enemies of leeches: ① Install protective nets and other pond facilities around the breeding pond to prevent all animals from entering the pond.

② It is forbidden to raise carnivorous fish. Wild fish must be killed in old fish ponds.

③ Dragonfly larvae, frogs and other aquatic insects and animals mainly harm newly hatched leeches and are the main targets of leech pest control. Therefore, in the season when leeches hatch in large numbers, these pests should be killed immediately once they are found. You can use night light trapping, install insect traps of more than 60 watts in the breeding pond, and when aquatic insects gather in large numbers on the water surface under the light, use a dense net to catch and kill them. Generally, do not use drugs to kill them, so as not to poison the leeches.

④ If you are not selling them, do not catch leeches frequently to avoid the leeches’ mucous membranes falling off and becoming infected with bacteria and dying.

⑤ Try to use clean water to breed leeches. Other breeding water and water from rivers and ditches must be filtered before use to prevent wild fish and aquatic insects from entering.

Leech disease control methods Leeches are highly adaptable, with a very low incidence rate, and no outbreaks or infectious diseases. Some leeches are sick mainly because the leeches are affected by external factors (water environment, biological factors, human factors) or their own factors, causing the normal metabolism to go out of control, disrupting the normal life activities of the leeches, resulting in a small number of leeches becoming diseased. The main diseases are as follows:

(I) Dryness disease If there is no sunshade on the leeches on the spawning platform around the pond, the temperature will be too high and the humidity will be too low, causing the leeches to dehydrate. Sick leeches have poor appetite, are less active or inactive, become thin and weak, have shriveled bodies, lose water and shrink, and turn black all over. Prevention and control methods: ① Soak the leeches in 1% salt water for 10 minutes each time, twice a day; ② Mix yeast tablets or oxytetracycline with feed to increase calcium-containing food and improve disease resistance; ③ Build a sunshade around the pond, put more wood blocks and tiles (with gaps underneath), and sprinkle water frequently to reduce temperature and increase humidity.

(II) White spot disease is caused by the protozoan Ichthyophthirius multifleus. The diseased leeches have white spots and bubbles on their bodies, small white spots, inflexible movements, unbalanced bodies when swimming, and anorexia. Prevention and control methods: ① Raise the water temperature to above 28°C and sprinkle 2% salt; ② Soak the diseased leeches in 2 mg/kg mercuric nitrate for 30 minutes each time, twice every hour; ③ Disinfect the pool water regularly with bleaching powder.

(III) Gastroenteritis is caused by eating spoiled food or indigestible food. Sick leeches have poor appetite, are lazy to move, and have red and swollen anus. Prevention and treatment methods: ① Mix 0.4% sulfamethoxazole with bait and feed; ② Mix 0.2% oxytetracycline with feed (blood clot) and feed; ③ Feed more fresh bait, do not feed spoiled bait, and abide by the "four fixed" principles of feeding.

(IV) Sucker bleeding refers to bleeding and swelling of the front and back suckers or a single sucker of the leech. After the disease occurs, it is rarely cured and recovered by itself. The main reason is that the sucker is the locomotion organ of the leech, and there is a mouth in the front sucker. Once the disease occurs, it will often lead to starvation, suffocation, difficulty in movement and death. The main cause of the disease is strain. One is artificial strain during capture; the other is that the breeding pond does not have a suitable hiding and fixed place, such as dense aquatic weeds, branches that can be entangled on it, etc., and leeches are attached to the pool wall for a long time, causing chronic strain. This disease often occurs in newly built leech ponds and breeders without breeding experience. The prevention and control method is: when capturing, do not pull hard, soak in 0.1% potassium permanganate solution for 10 to 15 minutes before putting leeches into the leech pond. At the same time, plant aquatic weeds or set up hidden fixtures in the leech pond.

(V) Abdominal lumps often occur at the leech's reproductive opening or excretion opening, especially redness, swelling and blood stasis at the reproductive opening. c: After the disease occurs, the leech has difficulty eating and the lumps cause body movement disorders. The leech has difficulty moving in the water and slowly dies. The causes of the disease are: first, it is caused by crushing during transportation. Since the male genital bones at the reproductive opening are larger, this place is most susceptible to crushing; second, it is caused by sucking indigestible debris; third, it is possible that the leech sucks parasites into the body while sucking the cavity fluid of snails and crucian carp, but there is no conclusion on this point. There is currently no good treatment for this disease, and the only way is to reduce squeezing during transportation.

(VI) Exhaustion: There are no symptoms during the onset of this disease. Leeches cannot move well in water and are often soaked in the water for a long time. Leeches often die from exhaustion. The cause of the disease is mainly due to long-term lack of air or hypoxia in the water and long-term insufficient food supply. This disease often occurs in high-density breeding ponds and ponds that are too small and difficult to adjust the water quality. Once this disease occurs, a large number of deaths often occur, and it is difficult to save them even if the water quality is urgently improved. Therefore, leech breeders should prevent the occurrence of this disease, build leech ponds as large as possible, change the water quality frequently, and provide sufficient feed. Leech ponds with alkaline water quality also often suffer from this disease. The pH of the breeding pond water should be measured regularly to control the water quality between neutral and slightly acidic to prevent the water quality from deteriorating.