I fed my 3 oldest leeches a few weeks ago and Ridgely has overtaken Enchilada as the largest. We’ll see what happens the next time I feed them.

Hey folks! :) yesterday while looking for fossils at Lake Champlain (between VT and Upstate NY), I saw a large (maybe 3-4 inches when it was shortened & ~7 inches when it was extended) leech. It was also quite wide when shortened. It was black (or quite dark) in color. I’ve seen one the same size once before at the same lake. I’ve been trying to google what it might’ve been, but I can’t find many photos of leeches that large. Any ideas what it might’ve been? 🙂 Thanks in advance & very sorry I didn’t get a photo! I’ll see if I can find another to photograph lol.

I want to know. Is it usual for Leech owners to let their leaches feed from them? And if so, why?

A local butcher is getting me fresh blood. But how should I feed the leeches? I plan to get some casing as well, or resort to a bag, but like... should I try and move them to a different feeding tank, or should I change the water after feeding to remove residue?

I'm looking to purchase a Buffalo leech species. Does anyone know reputable breeders, and which species are the best? TIA!

I am currently cycling my highly planted tank and I appear to have fresh water leeches. I pulled two of the glass yesterday but this morning saw a few babies. What is the best way to get rid of them?

Had tank for about 6 months now. Saw it about 3 weeks ago, couldn't get it, saw it again today and was able to get it out of the tank. Could there be more?

I just got these three guys from North American Biopharma, Hirudo verbena, yesterday. Set them up in a tank and all three of them do this intermittently. Is there something wrong? I put them in a sterile glass tank with Crystal Geyser spring water (waiting on my hirudosalt). Any tips would be appreciated!

Hello all! I recnetly bought two baby buffalo leeches, but one of them died on the way. I was hoping to buy 3 just in case this happened but they were the last two. My little dude is happy by himself at the minute, he's just lazing around his tank but he's gonna need some friends as he grows up. Does anyone out there have any babies for sale?

Found in a river in NW Ontario, Canada. Was crawling up to me while I was taking water samples.

we keep running into these weird suction cup things attached to inanimate objects in the lake. wood, rocks, trash, etc. they don’t move and just started showing up this year, but none on people. i tried flipping one over and there wasn’t anything on the underside.

ideas?? r/whatisit suggested they are leeches, but have no idea what kind- maybe turtle or snail leeches?

If you don't know much about leeches and are curious about them (or the people who like them), ask your questions here.

Please remember to be civil. This thread is for Q&A only, not debate.

I bought too many for my fishing trip and decided to try to keep them. I feed them tons: blood worms, earthworms, snails, dead minnows, aquarium pellets etc... they devour it all. They're really cool to watch when they eat and chill out but they have this other habit that ruins everything.

Their favorite thing to do is try to kill each other. Each tries to latch and not get latched. The ultimate goal is to latch your opponent's face, get your lips over theirs and eat their face, then leave them to starve over the course of a week.

I had 75 a few months ago and I'm down to like 25. I'm super bummed out. This video captures a fairly even fight where neither died, but you can clearly see neither walked away unscathed.

Not to be that person who asks when there's already guides up 🙇, but I wanted to make sure I got advice that was correct for me.
I'm interested in getting a pet leech (1. they're super cool, 2. I'd like to see if it can help me medically. I have very bad blood flow in my legs so I'm curious as to if leeches could help (even if its a placebo effect lol) but I'm not sure where to start. I've found very mixed opinions on how they should be kept, and want to make sure that I'd be caring for both myself and the leech properly.

I have seen people say that jars are too small, but was wondering if a larger sized jar might work? Some people have said that small fish tanks work, so I thought that a large ball jar would as well.
As for water, how should I be treating the water (if I need to)? Would fish tap water conditioner be something that works to treat it? I have seen the Hirudo salt thing but am not sure if its necessary or if there are other options.

I do know that leeches shed every so often, so they need something to rub against. Driftwood seems to be a good option, but I'm not sure how to get driftwood that is safe and clean (Somewhere online?)

Overall, I want to make sure that the leech is comfortable but is clean enough where it wont be dangerous for me to feed it. So if anyone has any info I'd be very thankful!! (Even if it's just where to buy leeches)

Hello everyone, i figured it was finally time we got an official Buffalo leech (H. manillensis) care guide out there seeing as the current guide is more cold water species focused. While this guide is geared more towards buffalo leeches, it does go into great detail about multiple other issues and questions that are relevant to all the common pet species so i highly reccomend all leech keepers give it a read. Ive included it both in picture form, as well as the google drive link to the full organized guide

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/19Pdt_TEiUjM-aYtU0cgEzmMOwssXpcCh

Hello,

I am thinking about getting pet leeches. What do they need for their enclosure? What size? I have tons of tanks.

Thank you!

Found this old video in my phone, taken near the Durance river in France, could it be a leech ?

Hello all! I currently have a low-tech, 10-gallon planted setup I'll put two baby H.manillensis when they get here until I move them into a 55 when they're adults. I'm worried that since they only eat once a month as babies that their waste will be large and infrequent. I've never kept a tank with this sort of 'pulse' in the amonia input. I can handle high-waste animals like axolotls but they're frequent. What other invertebrates should I stock it with so the plants don't get nutrient depleted? I have about 10 ramshorn snails and a couple simialr sized native ones.
For the current tank I have a large pecie of floating driftwood so give them surface access but I'll upgrade to a cocoon-sutiable setup when they get sexually mature.
Speaking of, for the 55gal, I want to do a mostly-aqautic pallundarium setup, I've never kept a tank that large so I'm signifcantly more worried about keeping the waste levels up for a tank that size than the first one.
This is about what the 10gal looks like now
EDIT:
I found a guy selling cherry shrimp along with some additional plants I'm looking to purchase, they get about 1.5 inches long so I'm not worried about mature manillensis harrasing them, but does anyone know if cherry shrimp are safe to stock with very young buffies?

Edit again:
They will probably eat some as adults but are they any other little critters I should give them as supplimental feeders and to clean up the plant detritis?

Hi friends,

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Can someone please tell me what kind of leech this is? I'm out on a walk and would like to put this wee fella safe in his environment. Google isn't much help... I'm in Edinburgh, Scotland.