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I threw some infected tomato, and potatoe plants into a bath, and hope to drown all the pests including psyllids. But then these slimy things appeared in the liquid. Their body is the same size as their tails, and they have feet like caterpillars, but swim under the water. I was using the water as a compost tea but they block the nozzles of my water can.

I've never seen anything like them before. I'm in New Zealand. I'm guessing it's some type of larvae.

Pests with tails insect soft bodies on bath

Pests swimming in the bath soft bodied insect swimming in bath

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You've created a drone fly nursery! These are the rat tailed larvae of drone flies - they love stagnant, contaminated water, specially if its got faeces or manure or rotting organic material in it, the more stinky the better. I hope that's not your bath in the house... more info in the link below

http://www.whatsthatbug.com/2006/03/19/rat-tailed-maggot/

http://www.uksafari.com/dronefly.htm

Drone flies themselves are not bad things, act as pollinators some of the time.

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  • Marvellous, fish food for the Goldies. Well if they're pollinators, I guess I'll leave them alone.
    – Graham Chiu
    Commented May 8, 2016 at 19:20

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