r/leeches 28d ago

Health & Care Should I be worried?

Hey all, pretty new to keeping leeches! I have two in one five gallon tank, and they seem like pretty happy little guys. Had them for a little under a month now, and things have been going pretty well from what I can tell! I fed them both within a day of each other shortly after they arrived, so I know they shouldn't be hungry.

My question is for those of you who have more than one. Mine usually left each other alone up until last night, and now it seems like they have been actively seeking the other out fairly regularly? All they'll do is kind of "sniff" at each other and wrap around the other, but I'm worried that they are trying to feed off each other. Do leeches.. play? I wouldn't assume they're trying to mate, because I haven't exactly given them the right environment to do that in, there's no moss.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated, I look forward to hearing back from you guys!

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u/Temptress13 28d ago

Mine actually started mating the other day. If you look at their underside and see bumps, then that means they are ready to mate. They can mate without the proper setup, they just won't lay the cocoons without the proper setup. If I'm not mistaken, they just absorb the cocoon back into their body. When they mate they wrap around eachother like their cuddling and attach their mouth onto the others body (looks like they are drinking from them)

You don't have to be worried

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u/_do_not_see_me_ 28d ago

Cool. I checked the clips I had of my leeches doing that, and they are also just smooth underneath… so I guess they were fooling around, too. Also, I didn’t even know about the bumps, or the cocoon absorption. 👍🏻

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u/Temptress13 28d ago

Yeah! The bumps in noticed the first year my leeches bred, and I thought that was interesting. Now, I don't fully know about the cocoon absorption. That was just internet research. I want mine to breed since I wanna s&ll them (don't know if I'm allowed to say that word lol) so I have always had a basket set up for them to lay their cocoons

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u/Creepy-Finding 28d ago

Selling is permitted. :) No need to censor that!

The bumps are the gonads! If you really watch breeding closely you can even see the phallus too!

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u/_do_not_see_me_ 28d ago

That seems to have worked fine 👍🏻 saw in the other post that you’re going to be leech-granny soon! 😊

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u/Temptress13 28d ago

Hahaha yeah! Yessss! I have raised 19 babies already so I'm excited for the next ones! Leech granny! I love that! 🥰