Woman Finds Microscopic Worms on Wood Laminate Floor with Moisture Problems

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“It seems to contain worms” says this reader about the organisms she has been finding on her wood laminate floor in her bedroom. She hopes that we can identify the worms she has found, though every picture seems to display something different.

In addition to the photographs, our reader also gives us a fair amount of context, which is much appreciated. Our reader is based in Eugene, Oregon and suspects she has moisture issues in her home. The bedroom in which the worms were found is located directly above a crawl space. For the entirety of the rest of the lower level, the floors are bamboo wood. Meanwhile, due to the moisture problems, the laminate flooring “appears to be turning into what seems like particle board” and is “separating at the ‘seems’ even”. The pictures our reader has taken are through a microscope.

Unfortunately, because these worms are microscopic, we will not be able to identify them, as this is beyond our reach. If they are microscopic to begin with, they may not be worms, strictly speaking, depending on how far our reader had to zoom in to see them. In addition to this, every picture shows what looks to be a completely different-looking organism, so we are not even sure that they are all from the same species. With all of this in mind, our reader seems already to have identified the source of this problem, and perhaps the source of the worms, namely the moisture problem. What we advise is that our reader get this problem fixed, and as a result the worm problem may also be resolved. Hiring a professional to look at her plumbing is probably the best way to go about it, as there may be a water leak in one of the pipes running through her bedroom floor or walls that needs urgent fixing. If the worm problem still persists after the moisture problem has been dealt with, she may want to take samples of the worms to her local county extension office to have them identified by someone who has direct physical access to the organisms.

To conclude, we cannot say exactly what organisms our reader found on her bedroom floor; not only does each one look completely different, but they are microscopic too, which makes identifying them that much harder. Nonetheless, we hope that our reader is able to get the moisture problem fixed as soon as possible and we wish her the best of luck.

 

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Summary
Woman Finds Microscopic Worms on Wood Laminate Floor with Moisture Problems
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Woman Finds Microscopic Worms on Wood Laminate Floor with Moisture Problems
Description
"It seems to contain worms" says this reader about the organisms she has been finding on her wood laminate floor in her bedroom. She hopes that we can identify the worms she has found, though every picture seems to display something different.
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Author: Worm Researcher Anton

5 thoughts on “Woman Finds Microscopic Worms on Wood Laminate Floor with Moisture Problems

  1. I have the same (or similar looking problem). The common denominator seems to be plumbing. Downstairs sewage pipe had overflowed into the house twice over the past four years. First, I noticed that my dog was itchy and miserable, then, I developed a rash on the back of my legs, had nausea/vomiting, recurrent headaches. I’ve been to multiple doctors about the rash, the dog has seen several vets and even a vet dermatologists.
    My mother had called a mental health ambulance because she thought I sounded delusional!!! What I was describing probably did sound bizarre, but that was what I observed, and I was starting to wonder if I has “lost it” also. Of course, the ambulance did not drag me away, but I do wonder how many people out there have experienced the same kind of gaslighting (especially from their family) while trying to figure out what the gross wormy-looking things are!?

  2. I am (ugh!) Stunned to say the least. I am you. My mother asked if i need or was on meds. I have taken pics n tried to video til i have no room left on my phone. It sounds just as what i have and still have. I do laundry vacuum clean throw away til i drop n nothing has helped. Think i am getting ahead n then nope. I believe you. Idk where u r from but i m in ohio. Mz******@gm***.com

    1. I’m in the same boat. It’s driving me nuts. I can’t eradicate the issue if I can’t get a proper identification. I clean til I hurt. The next morning I have to do it all over again. I am pretty certain we have a moisture issue here as well. I feel so alone.

  3. Hi! My daughter sent me the article on woman with moisture & laminate floors with worms? possibly. You comment each pic seems to contain something different.
    I am currently in month 3 of a somewhat similar situation. Noticing my cats both begin to scratch their ears on the same day, assumed mites, although I’ve never had that problem & mine stay inside. They were not responding to OTC mite treatments, & I began to see weird things.. 1st there were clear round drops on tile & counters w/ small black spots in them. The next things I saw, were some kind of 3D shaped “things” on my floors & counters. Thete were different sizes, some tinier than others, but most were clearly seen using my phone cameras’ zoom, & often there was indication of a trail of sorts, sticky or bits of the string like material. I referred to those as “gummi’s”, as the texture seemed like that. Usually there was a string or thread that was attached & stuck out 1 side, or ran thru the whole thing & out on both sides. My attempts to solve this, led me to believe that was its flagella, used for movement. It seemed to be a bacteria or fungus of some type, although my ability to see it to some extent, some more than others, meant it was a macro organism, ?? That may not even be “a thing” but I know some fungus is macro sized & who knows, new species of everything, are often found! Covid-19 is new, & bacteria are being reclassified & added to always. By the time I discovered this was in my home & not just getting into my cats ears, it was too late to stop it! I had 1st tried fumigating, although not sure what I was fumigating for. I took the pets into 1 bedroom, shut the door & set them off in the kitchen & living room. Next nite we switched, & I noticed it was on my mattress. What I was seeing, was very much similar to one of the things I would see on the cotton balls when using ear wash on my cats. Some were dark, yet somewhat transparent. Often it seemed to move into the cotton. Gel like in appearance, triangular or square-ish, no exact shape. But what I saw using my camera zoom, looked like rows & rows of them, & if you looked closely, holding the camera very still, you could see it was sorta, pulsating. Odd. Double fumigating over 2 days, keeping that door shut. Afterwards, I entered & saw many still there on the mattress. You could tell how it began on one side & moved toward the other end, by its progression or changes. Next thing I knew, looking for where a few may have gone if no longer on mattress, I see on the floor, everywhere in the darn carpet, what I think was a film, or biofilm? Yellowish- tan, or brownish, kinda all 3 shades depending on the thickness here & there. With black spots or areas, that soon after, within 24 hrs I’d say, had begun showing many white threads(?), that all would be wrapped around something, the black spot/chunk, whatever! Like a cocoon, & I now believe that to be a morphing transition. But in an environment in the open of sorts. Since then, I haven’t ever seen that morph emerge, but I would see a long black appendage?, like maybe a leg, or 2 or 3, randomly sticking out here & there. And while it was repeating the whole cycle, over & over, there was less space & I think it was just piling it on !! I finally purchased huge camping type tarps. Thick ones. Couldn’t stand the thought of stepping on that, even if I couldn’t see it with my naked eye! You could though, see the coating of white stringy stuff, at different times. Soo gross!
    All the while, I’m worrying about cats, as when cleaning ears, I see soo much come out, & also strange shapes & colors. And, I see one of the cats has in her tear area, under just 1 eye, what some might just call, eye gunk. I get it wiped, & look at it, seeing a couple of chunks, kinda thin w/ hairline threads wrapped snugly around at least 1 piece. I wonder how it came to get there. 2 days later, same eye stuff on same cat, somewhat different shapes, being in more pieces, yet basically the same. After 3X finding that, every 2 days, the piece I wiped off was whole. Finally I had a picture of something this had “morphed” into! Again, online searches & impossible to comprehend scientific articles, mention
    organisms that morph in both in the outer environments & differently in animal “hosts”. Anytime I felt I was on information that sounded like what I was dealing with, I’d read on, only to discover that particular one then had a couple dozen sub species, in my own terms, & shortly after seeing that, my head would explode! Its soo much! Unfortunately I haven’t found a match. All along I’ve taken pictures, hoping someone would recognize something, to help identify this.
    2 days later, I approached kitty, seeing nothing below her eye. But I did catch a glimpse of something, a flash of a shine from the corner of her eye. I lifted her upper lid, & it was there!!!
    I was mortified! She had also just had a tiny spot of blood on the cotton ball, when I had cleaned her ears, from scratching. I planned a vet visit for the next morning. By this time, more strangeness was afoot! 1 thing about those counter & tile floor gummi shapes, esp if on floor, they would begin to do something I can only describe as “melt”. It’d lose its shape, & on the tile, it looked as though it was going into areas of the tile. Really, but I usually was wiping it up, or pushing it into something to use as a sample to test.
    But here is where this relates to your previous article. When these things begin to replicate themselves, & they’re at a 3rd, 4th, 5th generation, or more, the organisms DNA can change wildly. This is why I believe her photos seemed to show many other different organisms or whatever. I haven’t seen hers, but I sure did see mine! Larger and at times, it was within, & a part of, attached, to a material it created on its own. I would literally clean, mop my floor, & walking in 30 mins later, there’s a sorta circular shaped very clear yet bubbly piece of plastic? Looked like thick plastic wrap, shiny, with what would be the organism in appx the middle. Entire piece maybe 3 inches diameter, encircling a rectangular, purple thing, about an inch long, maybe 1/4″ wide, & wavy. Picture a short, cooked, piece of fettuccine, purple. When flipped over, the bottom of it was blue, with a tiny edge of the purple all around. So weird. Or another, appearing as a torn piece of paper. I walked in to see a skinny, long triangular shape. The wider end in frt, somewhat raised up, & on its right, a portion that looked extended, appearing to be holding something small & black, but I’m sure it was just attached to that area. So you see what looks similar (to me anyway), to the back of a… Grimm reaper in a white hooded cape, frozen. On the floor, near the back of this thing, is a black ? splat? The same as it was at a previous “stage”, & same as on the extended portion of this torn tissue thing!! When looking at it as a whole, had it been moving along, it would have been dropping these black ? ‘s. Now that’s crazy! I have those pics too! Granted, I’d been dealing with this nearly 2 months by then! But the possibilities & variations are weird yet remarkable. Other singular bits & shapes, I’d sometimes see again, after throwing away in the trash can, nearer to the top but with the plastic of the trash bag, over the thing. Checking behind it, it WASN’T on the outside either. But it WAS passing thru the plastic. Further reading, I found that some organisms secrete enzymes that break down plastics. What else, I don’t know. But if it can use enzyme to break it down, is it also able to create something similar? I believe it was in 2013, that I read online of scientists at a company, using organisms to somehow help with plastics waste, & more I’m sure, but don’t recall the details. With these larger ones, I’m going to go further, by saying that after several of these “sightings”, I have had instances where I’ve knelt near it to take a pic, push it aside with a pencil, or into a jar for testing. When I’ve begun to actually do something to it, or move it, there have been a couple or 4-5 times, it has reacted. Yes, I went there! And I wouldn’t go there if I hadn’t seen this enough times to be certain I’m seeing what I think I’m seeing. Ya know? When its in/under these pieces of tissue, plastics, whatever, there’s a strand or more, of brown/tan material, much like the biofilm I think, that is the actual organism at that time. I’ve seen a thin strand of it under key areas of whatever the material is, & that is what creates the movement. The brains I suppose! I’ve had 1 side of another plastic shape, that had 2 extended areas on each side. When I approached it, the side closest to me raised up slightly. Enough to notice, it felt defensive to me. Actually had a bend in the, let’s call it a wing, off a main body. A short wing. 1/3 of the way down the wing, a strand of the tan material ran underneath it, and across the width of it. Thats where it bent, like ladder legs coming together, & rising at that point. But the annoying & most likely very unhealthy side of all this, still exists. Many tiny white straight pieces with an oval shape, cotton like piece attached to its end. An egg, spore?? How its gets on the tarp tops, I don’t know, maybe air flow from vents finds it? Another good idea, tell people to be sure those are cleaned as well. There may be some type of vent filter that can stop it.
    As for the county extension office. I just had an unfortunate experience with the entomologist they reccomended at a college in my state. I emailed pictures, wrote out the time line, descriptions. Asked for help. He called, I talked for a bit, he said that he wants to help. Its also his job to make me feel as though I can trust him. Nice as can be. Then he told me what the reality is, cos he wanted to be up front & honest. Even brought another biologists name into this, who had the “statistics”.
    The reality is, according to him, that in the majority of these cases, what we’re dealing with, is Delusional Parasitosis. Yep, can you believe that? I was shocked! Here I finally have the one person thats suppose to be able to help me identify this, cos I can’t get rid of it, without knowing what it is, to know what I have to use & do to get it out, forever! I read the biofilm is difficult, requiring the addition of certain chemicals or ingredients, otherwise it can return. So it upset me soo much to hear him tell me he’s sure I’m not actually seeing a type of parasite, or organism! But I did compose myself long enough to reiterate that he did say he would still test a sample for me!! Afterwards, I’m thinking this man came into our conversation with that decision already made in his head. And why is he mentioning another biologist? Are they both extension office referral contacts, & no longer want to do it, planning to just use these studies as a reason to not spend time on people needing help? Looking at the “delusion”, its people that from what I see, are saying parasites on on their body, or inside their body. I’ve said neither. And I’m perfectly capable of distinguishing real from delusion! Its kind of demeaning, as its reminiscent of the 17th-20th centuries, when doctors who didn’t have answers, told women they were being hysterical!! Can send these crazy pics if anyone wants. Just say where.

    1. You are dealing with Dictyostelium or “Dicty” for short. I don’t know how old this thread is, but that’s what it sounds like to me. Most people would call it a slim mold but it’s actually not a mold or fungi. Look up Dictyostelium. It’s insane. It’s first stage starts out looking like a slime mold with a black round head and clear stock but it eventually turns into a slug. It eats bacteria and it holds hundreds of harmful human pathogens . Some bacteria have evolved to use it as a host an till it gets to you. I’m currently dealing with a world of strange things. Just Google Dictyostelium and research an hopefully you’ll find some answers.

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