Flatworms.

[The wet one]

Are flatworms really that bad? They look ugly but don’t seem to be effecting anything. I have those yellow rasses and those blue damsels. Those guys don’t eat the flatworms. When I feed I’ll dip rocks in RO and take a couple dead flatworms and drop them in with the food to get them accustomed to eating them but rarely do I see them eat off the glass or a coral. Is there something I can throw in there to help? I don’t want to use flatwormexit because of the number of egg clusters and number of worms. I feel like I’d miss some and dump my tank.

 

[Stephen8169301]

Do you have any pics

 

[Sump Crab]

If red planaria then melanarus for the win.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Are flatworms really that bad? They look ugly but don’t seem to be effecting anything. I have those yellow rasses and those blue damsels. Those guys don’t eat the flatworms. When I feed I’ll dip rocks in RO and take a couple dead flatworms and drop them in with the food to get them accustomed to eating them but rarely do I see them eat off the glass or a coral. Is there something I can throw in there to help? I don’t want to use flatwormexit because of the number of egg clusters and number of worms. I feel like I’d miss some and dump my tank.

Not necessarily bad pertaining to most but its the infestation you have to be concerned with derived from eggs.
While they are not harmful as red planaria can be, they in numbers can smother bases of coral and block the needed light for production of zooxanthellae which is their energy source.
Removal can be accomplished by siphoning them with a 3/8" tubing into a nylon stocking and discard
OR
Add a wrasse such as Yellow coris, 6 line, lunare or malanurus OR even a springieri damsel which will eat them

With the number you have, for the next 2 weeks you will have to look for eggs and scrape off as there is likely some and would be future acoels. Eggs are really tiny

 

[Rmckoy]

If red planaria then melanarus for the win.

Blue velvet nudi , green spotted mandarin , and Mel wrasse worked for me

I believe most of the work was done by the nudibranch

 

[Sump Crab]

Blue velvet nudi and melanarus are only ones I know guaranteed to eat them. I’ve seen and read about plenty of coris and six line and springers that won’t touch them.

 

[Rmckoy]

Blue velvet nudi and melanarus are only ones I know guaranteed to eat them. I’ve seen and read about plenty of coris and six line and springers that won’t touch them.

They’re said to all eat them and I stocked my tank with one of each .

 

[Sump Crab]

They’re said to all eat them and I stocked my tank with one of each .

I’ve lived with red planaria for around 20 years now and they reached “plague like proportions” back in the day until I bought a melanarus wrasse. Since then if I have a melanarus wrasse in my tank I can never find a planaria but if I don’t have a melanarus wrasse they slowly begin to appear again. I’ve probably had 4 different melanarus over the years and each one ate them.

 

[The wet one]

Do you have any pics

 

[The wet one]

Not necessarily bad pertaining to most but its the infestation you have to be concerned with derived from eggs.
While they are not harmful as red planaria can be, they in numbers can smother bases of coral and block the needed light for production of zooxanthellae which is their energy source.
Removal can be accomplished by siphoning them with a 3/8" tubing into a nylon stocking and discard
OR
Add a wrasse such as Yellow coris, 6 line, lunare or malanurus OR even a springieri damsel which will eat them

With the number you have, for the next 2 weeks you will have to look for eggs and scrape off as there is likely some and would be future acoels. Eggs are really tiny

Gotcha thank you. So at this point since I don’t want to treat with a chemical control population with siphon?

 

[The wet one]

Blue velvet nudi , green spotted mandarin , and Mel wrasse worked for me

I believe most of the work was done by the nudibranch

I heard that the nidi’s are not very hardy. Eaither way I’ll grab a couple tomorrow. Hm I also didn’t know that the mandarin will eat them.

 

[The wet one]

I’ve lived with red planaria for around 20 years now and they reached “plague like proportions” back in the day until I bought a melanarus wrasse. Since then if I have a melanarus wrasse in my tank I can never find a planaria but if I don’t have a melanarus wrasse they slowly begin to appear again. I’ve probably had 4 different melanarus over the years and each one ate them.

Maybe I should throw in a few more in then. Thankfully I have a good number of wrasses but I think I might feed them too well. I’ve yet to see any of my damsels or wrasses eat one off the glass. They are more concerned with the pods and bristleworms

 

[Sump Crab]

Maybe I should throw in a few more in then. Thankfully I have a good number of wrasses but I think I might feed them too well. I’ve yet to see any of my damsels or wrasses eat one off the glass. They are more concerned with the pods and bristleworms

most fish, including most wrasse, do not eat red planaria. Melanarus do though.

 

[zoomonster]

I had an infestation like that in my ricordia grow tank years ago and they were harmless but unsightly. Pretty sure I used flatworm exit. Pretty careful about dipping these days and not had one in years but also have a melanurus and a sixline in my tank that gobble up most everything. Then again, I found a couple euphyllia eating ones on a torch today and CoralRx got rid of them. Thats a piece vs. a tank though. Best advice is never put anything in your tank w/o dipping thoroughly. Now if you want to get rid of the amount you have now it's probably a matter of removing and dipping everything while you treat the tank and do a massive water change.

 

[The wet one]

I had an infestation like that in my ricordia grow tank years ago and they were harmless but unsightly. Pretty sure I used flatworm exit. Pretty careful about dipping these days and not had one in years but also have a melanurus and a sixline in my tank that gobble up most everything. Then again, I found a couple euphyllia eating ones on a torch today and CoralRx got rid of them. Thats a piece vs. a tank though. Best advice is never put anything in your tank w/o dipping thoroughly. Now if you want to get rid of the amount you have now it's probably a matter of removing and dipping everything while you treat the tank and do a massive water change.

I stuffed my tank with 8 damsels,5 6line, 3 melanurus, 3 sunspot and 3 blue chromis, some kind of mandarin (I’ll post a pic if someone wants) and 2 pipe fish. Previously in this thread someone said they heard it can work. It does work. Suck up a few flatworms, dip them in fresh, mix with food. In a couple days they were eating them off the class. Same with the pipefish and the mandarin.