Eliminating monti eating nudis for good.

[HB AL]

I have lots of different corals shrooms, acros, lps, and various montis. I’ve had monti eating nudis for quite a while but they only attack the spongodes montis exclusively. I’ve had the spongodes monti in my system for atleast 3 years. I have fragged it a lot over the years creating numerous other colonies in my system. And after some months go by the nudis find there way to the new growing frag even if it’s on the other side of the tank and I watch them closely and when I see some white skeleton areas at the bases I turn them over and viola there they are. Tried dipping originally long ago but they come back. Recently started scrubbing the dead areas close to the good tissue and on the underside of the dead tissue where they reside with a brush aggresvly where I see them but eventually after a while they they show back up. They don’t touch the other montis so I wonder if these only have a test for the spongodes corals in my tank. Any ideas on how to possibly eradicate them for good from the spongodes? I’m not really stressing over it since they only eat one type of coral of all the different corals I have but it would be nice to finally completely eliminate them. I remove all the various frags and colonies of spongodes from the tank, that’s how I can scrub them them all clean. Wondering if they lay eggs possibly on rock next to where they are and I’m assuming adults roam the tank that’s how they find a frag of it eventually. Thanks for any tips.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

They lay eggs much more randomly along the base rocks of the coral and defiantly roam away from the corals more than aefw which is why they are pretty hard to beat. Dipping the corals weekly can sometimes be tough since the nudi roam from the coral more than most pests. Maybe dipping during the high day light would be best since they probably come out more at night.
Personally I would keep only your favorite pieces and get rid of the others to make it easier on you if your going to dip. Unfortunately it’s the only way I know of to get rid of them.

 

[HB AL]

Ya I get it, they are extremely hard to eradicate once they are in the tank and well established. Since the ones I have only slowly wreck havoc on the spongodes corals throughout the tank and leave all other montis untouched I was thinking of a few different approaches. 1 theory is to remove all spongodes from display, setup the 20g i have in the garage and try to physically eradicate them from the corals over a period of time (months). Then when I’m 100% sure they are gone reintroduce them to the dt. Other option is since I haven’t allowed any of them to encrust onto the rocks so that I can remove them from the dt I can treat them outside the dt by scrubbing with a brush vigorously the undersides where I see the clusters of them when the lights are on but not the eggs (I’m assuming they are tiny) then carefully maybe with a syringe apply some chemical to the area that will kill the eggs too. Question on this is what chemical will kill them especially the eggs? I’m open to any chemical agent as it will be going only on the dead areas of the coral directly on the nudi clusters hiding from the lights, assuming the eggs are also in the nudi clusters and on the dead undersides of the coral where the adults have eaten and killed those sections. Aside from trying peroxide (gonna try that now followed by bleach) in those areas any other potent items like maybe bleach that might be worth a try to squirt on the adult clusters and eggs? I’m open to all options I’m not really stressing since I’ve been keeping them at bay with my current regime but full eradication would be nice. Thanks AL

 

[jdiefenbaugh]

I've dealt with them on a large scale, and people generally don't want to hear my advice, but the best way is to make micro frags you can easily inspect for egg masses and nudis, put them in a different tank, and throw the rest of your montipora in the trash. Stay montipora fallow for 1 year, and then re-introduce. I've had them spring up after 3 years with no montipora sp. in a large system (1000 gal.). They are a PITA. I've tried potassium permanganate baths, repeated dips/scrubs, predation, etc. etc. Just get rid of the food source, just my $.02.

 

[SCReef'n]

They prefer to lay eggs right at the tissue line where the newly hatched babies can easily find fresh food. Frag away all the dead skeleton plus a few cm and toss the bad end. Then place the good frags on a rack or the sand bed where they can be monitored. I’ve had pretty good success eradicating then in this way. Dipping will get the adults but I’ve had better success with this method. Their preference for laying eggs near healthy tissue is something you can exploit.

 

[HB AL]

I've dealt with them on a large scale, and people generally don't want to hear my advice, but the best way is to make micro frags you can easily inspect for egg masses and nudis, put them in a different tank, and throw the rest of your montipora in the trash. Stay montipora fallow for 1 year, and then re-introduce. I've had them spring up after 3 years with no montipora sp. in a large system (1000 gal.). They are a PITA. I've tried potassium permanganate baths, repeated dips/scrubs, predation, etc. etc. Just get rid of the food source, just my $.02.

Your way to proceed forward is probably the best I've heard. But I dont have too many montis left other than some caps so I'm really not that worried about them and will experiment with applying chemicals on them and see what happens. Now if these were eating my acros it would be WW3. Thanks for the advice.

 

[HB AL]

They prefer to lay eggs right at the tissue line where the newly hatched babies can easily find fresh food. Frag away all the dead skeleton plus a few cm and toss the bad end. Then place the good frags on a rack or the sand bed where they can be monitored. I’ve had pretty good success eradicating then in this way. Dipping will get the adults but I’ve had better success with this method. Their preference for laying eggs near healthy tissue is something you can exploit.

They definitely cruise the tank because I've fragged up pieces over time, placed far away from other spongodes and eventually within a couple months they find there way to those too. Will continue to brush off the visual ones and gonna experiment with injecting chemicals like bleach etc.. to them since they are always at the base on the underside when the lights are on and in a group together. Since they only like the spongodes any of the many acros I'm gonna just take a relaxed approach.