i saw a flat worm with two red stripes swimming

We recommend that our reader makes sure he cleans his toilet regularly (once a week preferably!) and removes the maggot from his toilet and moves it to a nearby pond/puddle in a park. On the other hand, they typically should not be found in your toilet. We are aware this sounds disgusting, but it is necessary information! This makes sense, as toilet water is stagnant, and the maggots could be attracted to human waste, as they feed off decaying matter. Although our reader did not specify where in his bathroom the creature was found, we will assume he found it in his toilet as it was swimming, and especially since he was concerned it may have come from his stomach. Locations they can be found include: lagoons, manure pits, and well, toilets.

Rat-tailed maggots are most commonly found in stagnant water, according to the entomology department of the University of Kentucky. The ridges on its sides are the beginnings of legs, and the tail is actually a respiratory tract that the larva uses to breathe in water. The two black dots at its head are actually antennae, according to the diagram below.

Rat-tailed maggots are the larval stage of a hover fly or drone fly. We are pleased to inform our reader that we have identified this worm as a rat-tailed maggot, and that he has little to worry about in terms of this being a medical problem. Our reader did well in sending an assortment of pictures, including the one below which displays the creature bending its body to turn in the water.

The tail is segmented into two parts, one thicker part emerging from its body that thins out into the second part, the tip of the tail. What makes this critter interesting is its long tail, which seemingly spans the length of its body.

Two small, black dots at its front seem to be a set of eyes, and a black stripe adorns its back, though given its transparency, it could very well be something inside the creature. Our reader is worried that this creature may have come from his stomach, and requests that we identify it.įrom the image, we can see that this creature has a slender, ridged body that seems to be transparent in color. He says it is about an inch in length and “swims like a worm, contracting and extending its body”. A concerned reader recently sent in this image of a worm-like creature he has been finding in his bathroom for the past two months.

I saw a flat worm with two red stripes swimming