“My home is infested inside and out with thin white worms that appear to be accompanied by or some stage of a thin black worm”, writes Shari in her submission regarding the worm pictured below. “They scatter through the air with the slightest disturbance. I tried spraying them down with bleach attached to water hoses, but they just end up floating in the air and landing on me. Pest control has been no help in identifying. I live in Sarasota, Florida. My house is old, built in 1959 and had a major plumbing issue. Cast iron pipes broke underground and the entire plumbing clogged up. It was so bad water was coming out of the vent pipe on the roof. I’m wondering if this worm issue is related to the plumbing. Especially since the pipes broke underground.”
To start with, we want to thank Shari for the excellent amount of context, as it was always helpful to us when trying to identify a given worm. That said, the photo and video are unfortunately not as helpful, as the photo is quite blurry, and it is not clear to us what we are seeing in the video, other than a close up of someone’s arm and a floor. Given Shari’s description of the worm, we would say they could be horsehair worms: a species of parasitic worm that infects insects (not humans or pets!). They develop inside their insectile hosts and burst forth when the insect nears a body of water. That said, horsehair worms do not congregate in large groups and infest homes. The only time they are free-roaming is when they are trying to find a mate. On top of that, they are not so light that they “scatter through the air with the slightest disturbance.” So, with that said, we do not think these are horsehair worms.
We have never heard of worms that act like the ones Shari found, so we cannot give an accurate identification of them. What we recommend doing is contacting her council about the plumbing issue and the discovery of the worms, as they may very well be related. It is not unheard of for worms to enter people’s homes through the drains when there is a leak underground. That is actually how a lot of earthworms end up in people’s toilets, though these are clearly not earthworms. On top of that, we encourage Shari to take some of the worms to her local county extension office, as someone will be able to physically examine them there, and will have a better chance than us to provide a confident identification. She could likewise bring samples to the entomology department at a university.
If Shari is concerned about how the worms might affect her health, we recommend consulting a medical parasitologist, as they specialize in diagnosing and treating medical issues caused by organisms. To find a medical parasitologist or other health care provider who can actually help, Shari can do one or more of the following:
– Visit our parasite care resources page here: https://www.allaboutworms.com/get-medical-attention-and-tests-for-parasites
– Search for a medical parasitologist in Sarasota using this directory of medical parasitology consultants: https://www.astmh.org/for-astmh-members/clinical-consultants-directory.
– Search for a local parasitologist by doing a Google search for “medical parasitologist Sarasota, Florida” or “tropical medicine specialist Sarasota, Florida”.
To conclude, we do not know what these worms are that Shari found, as we cannot tell what physical characteristics they possess other than their body shape and color from the photo, and we cannot think of any worm-like organisms that are so light that they can float through the air. If any of our other readers do think of any worm-like organisms that fit Shari’s description, they are welcome to share their ideas in the comments section below. Otherwise, we hope that we have still been able to help Shari to some degree, and we wish her the very best.
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It’s been five years for us here. In Northern Ontario Canada. The hairs that fall from the ceiling, the black thread like looking worms that clog the dryer vent, and the weird wriggling things that we excrete from our bodies. We’re all so sick and nobody is going to help us. Doctors are useless. The gas lighting is so hard to live with.
I’ve had these for at least six years now. They’ve been “quiet “ for some months now but came back ready to party a couple days ago.
You will go forum to forum and see SO many others saying the exact same thing, yet there is still zero explanation. You’ll be obsessed by it;,take hundreds of videos and pictures. Most likely you’ll be labeled “crazy, “
and probably feel that you are.
Here’s to hoping that one day it will come to light!
I also personally disagree with folks believing horsehair worm only infects insects and not humans however, I do hope that I am wrong.
You’re so right about everything you said.
I have them also and when you take video sometimes it distorts the video, also they go through solid mass i set up different containers in an area where i saw them most, they are not normal they travel through glass, plastic, etc… i have set up water in glass containers and catch them daily, this started around 2 weeks ago
I have these worms too. A lot of people do. Doctors are ignoring it. Maybe contact a scientist.
Looks like a horsehair worm.