Dealing with sponge on zoo frags

roshi719 · Jul 6, 2009

I remember hearing something about a lugol's dip or a peroxide dip, but I don't rember how long you leave them in for. Oh and I already tried leaving them out of the water for almost 20 minutes. even squeezed all the air out of the sponge, It still lived. I must have a mutant on my hands.

killingseed2000 · Jul 6, 2009

you can just take the rock out and drip the iodin right on the sponge, leave for a good maybe 30. the wash off before placing in the tank ,tank water is fine. i have done this many time the dipping doesn do as well with sponges as a droping. you may want to repeat once a week. that is how i kill of the sponges and may other unwanted growths that impeade the growth of my zoa's.

roshi719 · Jul 6, 2009

Thanks for the tip. I'll give it a try when I get home tonight.

JuniorMC8704 · Jul 6, 2009

pull them out, and leave them out in the open air for 15-20 minutes. that should wipe it out pretty quick.

roshi719 · Jul 6, 2009

JuniorMC8704 said:
pull them out, and leave them out in the open air for 15-20 minutes. that should wipe it out pretty quick.

Left it out for 20 min and squeezed all the water out of the sponge... still alive:sad:

revhtree · Jul 6, 2009

I have just scraped off as much as possible and then put it back in the tank.

On the other hand I posted a while back about some sponge getting on all my zoa frags. I would scrape them and pull it off and it would come right back. The last time I did it, the sponge came back and was getting bad and then all of the sudden one day it was gone. Every frag that had issues cleared up by itself. My alk was pretty low and i started dosing to get it up. I wonder if that had something to do with it.

er1c.the.reefer · Jul 6, 2009

is it this orange slimey looking sponge? i have that all over the place but it seems to only grow in darker areas of the tank.

killingseed2000 · Jul 6, 2009

ya ,takeing them out of the water really doesnt work. may kill the top layer of them but they will regrow. the iodine and scraping are the best methods.

roshi719 · Jul 6, 2009

It's kinda pinkish and really slimy. Looks like lugols's it is then!! Thanks guys!

Braves Fan · Jul 8, 2009

I pulled out a frag yesterday that I have with the same problem, used tweezers on it, but I missed a bit and will have to do it again. After I picked the frag clean I see that the sponge had smothered out about a third of the polyps on the frag. I didn't know what was growing on the frag and was told what it was and to try using the tweezers on it. After picking the frag cleaned I cleaned the frag in a bowl of tank water before putting back into the tank.

Cuda · Jul 8, 2009

What about a sponge eater like a little starfish?

RaddReef319 · Jul 9, 2009

Are you saying that sponges like orange corky and red tree will grow over a zoanthid colony? I'm considering adding some to my tank but wouldn't want them to do that.

pmoradi2002 · Jul 10, 2009

RaddReef319 said:
Are you saying that sponges like orange corky and red tree will grow over a zoanthid colony? I'm considering adding some to my tank but wouldn't want them to do that.

save yourself time and money and just throw in the sponge at the sink :wink: