Help save Acros

[Mwatts12]

Hello everyone,

I posted on a @brandon429 thread, however, I did not want to hijack. @Dburr1014 who has already begun to help me, thank you.

My long sad story:

I have been reefing for 7 years, this is my 3rd tank. I have dealt with issues before however NOT like this.

I upgraded to a 225-gallon CDA tank last February. This was meant to be my dream tank which I would have for years. For example, I had a crane set the tank in my backyard to get it into the house..... pretty committed

After setting it up, I did a mixture of KPA rocks (65pounds) and dry rocks . I wanted more rock so I ordered 15 pounds from one of the other ocean live rock sites and placed it in the sump. This I believe was my mistake. I saw it had 1 aptasia on a rock. I took the rock out completely scraped it and placed back.

*** the KPA live rock was from my previous tank, it was properly Qt'D and in a tank for a while. It was predator / pest free.

just like most, I had a BAD dinos outbreak which lasted about 6 months. As it was clearing I was beyond excited!! What a nightmare!! Once it cleared I saw hundreds and hundreds of baby aptasia throughout the tank. On the rocks on the bare bottom literally everywhere....

next to the tank: 225-gallon CDA with 6 large tangs, a niger trigger, and several chromis and anthias.... no real predators. I have 20 ish acro frags as well.

I added 15 nudis last summer, they were acclimated, lights turned off and the jar they arrived in was set against a rock.

2 months later repeat 15 more / 3 months later 15 more but this time in acclimation I placed the nudis on a piece of rock that was set in the tank.

after 6 months not even a dent. I do have millions and millions of pods from the ocean live rock.

and by this time, the aptasia is growing bigger and more of them.

In the last month, I added a CBB, 2 blue head Klein and about 30 peps from various sites.

.... still nothing.

*******So my question is. Due to having about 20 acro frags which are healthy and growing and large tangs. What is the best action to take?

*******If i restart, I understand to place tangs in a large 70 gallon tote for a few days. How do I keep the acros alive? Whats the best course of action?

I will post pics later today. the pics will just show a massive infest of aips but I know we all love pics.

 

[jackson6745]

You want to restart because of aptasia? Try a file fish, more nudis, and a bunch of peppermints.

 

[Dburr1014]

Can't wait to see the pics!

 

[Timfish]

Three thoughts if they haven't been mentioned yet:

One - use a high powered laser to target aiptasia specifically, this likely may be mostly cathartic and obviously is not a long term solution, at most just a control method.

Two - Using a small diameter steel straw ~1/8" and a large diameter siphon hose, 9/16" or 3/4" to scrap and suck apitasia off rocks. The large diameter hose and small nozzle will create a fairly strong suction but care must be taken as it will damage any coral that is close to the nozzle. Again not a long term solution and less cathatic due to the hassle of working carefully around corals.

Three - Start breeding berghia in a seperate system. This strikes me as the best long term solution without having to tear dwon your system. You likely have stuff in yor tank that may be feeding of the smaller berghia and almost certainly will feed off the egg coils so you're not getting any reproduction. Raising them seperately gives you a consitant supply and you can start grwoign some out to larger size so hopefully they'll survive longer in your system.

Maybe both #1 & #3?

This may not be much help but I've seen aiptasia infestation clear up on their own so some of @brandon429 or @Dburr1014 ideas might help.

 

[Acros]

In my opinion, you do not have to restart the tank due to aiptasia. If the tank is struggling to grow coral, go ahead and restart. You will mostly likely have to deal with the ugly stage again. Aiptasia will eventually make it into the tank no matter what you do.

• How big are your aiptasia? Do they generally stay small? I have that kind and it does not bother any corals. Peppermints will take care of them.
• What do you feed the tank and how often?
• A daylight picture would be helpful.

 

[Crustaceon]

You can use a new/leftover but well rinsed syringe from a test kit, make a toothpaste-thick mix of kalkwasser and ro/di and go after each aiptasia individually. Turn off your circulation pumps, load up a syringe of the paste, sneak up on one of the nems and WHAM!! Squirt a little bit right in its mouth. The paste will stay in place and will alk-burn the snot out of aiptasia, killing it within a day or two. You can turn your circulation pumps back on after 30 min. Try to go after maybe 10% of the aiptasia per day at most since you'll be squirting a good amount of kalk into the system and dying nems can release toxins, not to mention killing a bunch of critters at once could cause an ammonia spike. You might end up with entire swaths of rock covered in kalk paste for days at a time. This is perfectly fine and will dissolve over time.

I've used this method literally thousands of times and it works every bit as well as aiptasia-x IMO.

 

[Mwatts12]

This was a few months ago. If you zoom in on the center rock you can get an idea of how the rest of it looks. Ill grab more to try and really capture how bad later when i get home

 

[livinlifeinBKK]

You can use a new/leftover but well rinsed syringe from a test kit, make a toothpaste-thick mix of kalkwasser and ro/di and go after each aiptasia individually. Turn off your circulation pumps, load up a syringe of the paste, sneak up on one of the nems and WHAM!! Squirt a little bit right in its mouth. The paste will stay in place and will alk-burn the snot out of aiptasia, killing it within a day or two. You can turn your circulation pumps back on after 30 min. Try to go after maybe 10% of the aiptasia per day at most since you'll be squirting a good amount of kalk into the system and dying nems can release toxins, not to mention killing a bunch of critters at once could cause an ammonia spike. You might end up with entire swaths of rock covered in kalk paste for days at a time. This is perfectly fine and will dissolve over time.

I've used this method literally thousands of times and it works every bit as well as aiptasia-x IMO.

This works!

 

[Mwatts12]

I feed frozen once a day (8 cubes) . Pellets twice a day. Nitrate 25 / po4 .15 - steady

acros are doing great. Only time I lose one is when fish knock behind a rock.

The aptasia are good size. I would say medium to large.

 

[Troylee]

A syringe with hot vinegar will destroy them instantly!

 

[Mwatts12]

I made the pic brighter and put a circle around the areas easy to see in this pic. Now imagine every rock looking likes this, including the corners of the tank and the bottom n

 

[Acros]

Are all the wavy things aiptasia?

 

[Mwatts12]

I appreciate everyone commenting! I will without a doubt implement the ideas provided.

 

[Mwatts12]

@Acros they sure are. every square inch of rock is covered.

and this is what I am trying to really capture to make the point. With this kind of infest is a restart needed or stay in the fight? And if restart, ideas to save the acros!!

 

[JCOLE]

I see you tried a CBB and Peppermints already. Have you tried Aiptasia eating file fish? My CBB keeps my DT clear and my filefish kept my frag tank clear. I would recommend one or two of them.

 

[Troylee]

I cut the acros off and take a rock once a week out and muratic acid wash that thing! Wow! There’s gotta be different aiptasia Because most people get a random here or there and I’ve seen a couple cases like yours where it’s just insane! Man! That’s crazy lol..

 

[Dburr1014]

Wow, that's pretty bad.
Kalk paste is going to add a lot of alkalinity.
Lemon juice is another killer. I have used lemon juice and make the Kalk paste with that, killer.
Problem is you can only do a few a week.

Doesn't look like you can take out one rock at a time and soak it.
I do like the idea #3 @Timfish gave. Berghia and a breeding tank.

So many aptaisia in this tank I can't believe berghia didn't work for you.

What else is in the tank besides the fish list?
Shrimps, crabs, ect.?

 

[Acros]

@Acros they sure are. every square inch of rock is covered.

That is bad. ngl.

In my experience, you will have to starve the peppermints for them to go after apitasia. Peppermints won't eat aiptasia as long as you feed any frozen food. Can you feed just pellets for a month and see if that makes a difference?

If you want to restart the tank, you have plague proportions of aiptasia to justify a tank restart. However, there is no way to restart the tank, and the acropora does not take a hit. This is a long battle regardless of which route you go. You will have to evaluate the end result in 6 months from now and decide which way to go.

 

[Crustaceon]

I've seen infestations this bad before and the best course of treatment was popping the coral frags off of the rocks and placing them on a frag rack. The next step was removing the rock and muriatic acid soaking. Third step was rinsing the rock and re-curing in a brute trashcan for two months before reintroducing. You don't technically HAVE to have rock in your tank, but you might have to increase the water change percentage to keep nutrients in check. It'll look weird having just sand and a frag rack in your tank for a few months, but it will solve your problem and will save your corals. If you have maybe 50-100 nems to deal with, kalk is the way to go. For this situation, you're going to have to take more drastic measures.

 

[Mwatts12]

@Dburr1014 @Timfish @Acros

If we can go more into the berghia topic because I have been confused at this.

Like I posted, a total of 45 berghias were added over a 6-7 month period.

15 berghias were added 3 different times. I placed them into a 5 gallon tank and acclimated them for 1 hour.

at time of berghias, no crabs only about 200 cerith snails and 3 Mexican turbos.

No butterflies, no shrimp, no wrasses.

The only thing I have wondered is, from the KPA rocks I have just an absolute absurd amount of pods. Would they be affecting the berghias? I considered getting a mandarine to help with the load of pods.

its not going to be water quality for the berghias, and I had my flow turned way down for months.

Why arent they surviving???