Interceptor and dinos?

[Marc2952]

after noticing some of my acros have stopped having PE i started looking at them closely and i believe its red bugs. The issue is that i have gone to 4 vets already and they all decline to give me a prescription. Another issue is that i have been battling dinos for the past 7 months and just now have been able to beat them i also have a ton of pods. Im afraid that if i do use interceptor its gonna destabilize the tank and make the dinos get worse again as that will be the nail in the coffin for me in this hobby. I also dont have room to move my 2 emerald crabs, 2 blood shrimp and about a dozen hermit crabs and snails.

Also one more thing, ive been going fallow for the past 2 months due to ich ( as you see everything is happening together in this dang tank lol ) so there is nothing that is gonna eat them. I currently have a coris wrasse,pintail fairy wrasse,tang, 2 flame hawks and a clown on the QT.

 

[jsker]

Sounds like you have a lot going on #reefsquad some help please

 

[Miller535]

You want to use interceptor for the red bugs?

What makes you think you have red bugs?

 

[blstravler]

after noticing some of my acros have stopped having PE i started looking at them closely and i believe its red bugs. The issue is that i have gone to 4 vets already and they all decline to give me a prescription. Another issue is that i have been battling dinos for the past 7 months and just now have been able to beat them i also have a ton of pods. Im afraid that if i do use interceptor its gonna destabilize the tank and make the dinos get worse again as that will be the nail in the coffin for me in this hobby. I also dont have room to move my 2 emerald crabs, 2 blood shrimp and about a dozen hermit crabs and snails.

Also one more thing, ive been going fallow for the past 2 months due to ich ( as you see everything is happening together in this dang tank lol ) so there is nothing that is gonna eat them. I currently have a coris wrasse,pintail fairy wrasse,tang, 2 flame hawks and a clown on the QT.

Are you 100% sure it is Red Bugs? You said you believe it is - they should be pretty easy to see.

 

[tankstudy]

after noticing some of my acros have stopped having PE i started looking at them closely and i believe its red bugs. The issue is that i have gone to 4 vets already and they all decline to give me a prescription. Another issue is that i have been battling dinos for the past 7 months and just now have been able to beat them i also have a ton of pods. Im afraid that if i do use interceptor its gonna destabilize the tank and make the dinos get worse again as that will be the nail in the coffin for me in this hobby. I also dont have room to move my 2 emerald crabs, 2 blood shrimp and about a dozen hermit crabs and snails.

Also one more thing, ive been going fallow for the past 2 months due to ich ( as you see everything is happening together in this dang tank lol ) so there is nothing that is gonna eat them. I currently have a coris wrasse,pintail fairy wrasse,tang, 2 flame hawks and a clown on the QT.

Order yourself some Dr. G's coral dip. It's milbemycin oxime, which is what interceptor is, combined with RO water and vitamin C. Just make sure if you have any dogs around to not let them take a sip.

 

[Marc2952]

Are you 100% sure it is Red Bugs? You said you believe it is - they should be pretty easy to see.

Im not %100 sure but i did checked some of my acros at night with a magnifier and what looks like tiny fleas moving around the coral, fast little buggers too. And i notices they are currently only on two of my acros both of which have no PE and skin looking a bit pale. I will try to.take pictures once i get home. I tried to dip them in coral RX and helped a bit but they always pop back up.

 

[Marc2952]

You want to use interceptor for the red bugs?

What makes you think you have red bugs?

Ive checked under a magnifier and looks similar to what looks like red bugs, almost lile fleas.

 

[Marc2952]

Order yourself some Dr. G's coral dip. It's milbemycin oxime, which is what interceptor is, combined with RO water and vitamin C. Just make sure if you have any dogs around to not let them take a sip.

I was checking that out and bought it on ebay. Now the question is will that cause an imbalance in the system? Being that i have the dinos under control i dont want them to comd back since its taken me months to win that battle.

 

[Marc2952]

Sounds like you have a lot going on #reefsquad some help please

Tell me about it, from dinos to bryopsis, velvet etc ive gone through alot on this first tank lol

 

[Marc2952]

My guess is that maybe those critters have been in the tank for a while and my wrasse has just kept it in check? I noticed a month after going fallow they started popping up aswell as an explosion of amphipods. I still got one more month of fallow period so i must act now.

 

[melanotaenia]

Im not %100 sure but i did checked some of my acros at night with a magnifier and what looks like tiny fleas moving around the coral, fast little buggers too. And i notices they are currently only on two of my acros both of which have no PE and skin looking a bit pale. I will try to.take pictures once i get home. I tried to dip them in coral RX and helped a bit but they always pop back up.

The symptoms you are describing are likely red bugs; I had a similar issue about six months ago.

I would just get a small little 5 gallon tank, throw a rock in there with your inverts, and do two treatments of interceptor in your main display; if you dip the SPS the bugs will just come back if they are in the tank.

You need to treat at least twice with interceptor in my experience spread about a week apart to really get them all. If you have pods now they will come back and should rebound after treatment if your tank is healthy.

 

[Marc2952]

The symptoms you are describing are likely red bugs; I had a similar issue about six months ago.

I would just get a small little 5 gallon tank, throw a rock in there with your inverts, and do two treatments of interceptor in your main display; if you dip them they will just come back if they are in the tank. You need to treat at least twice in my experience spread about a week apart to really get them. If you have pods now they will come back and should rebound after treatment if your tank is healthy.

Can the shrimps be added with my fish in the QT? I got 1 that hasnt been treated with copper, issue is that the two flame hawks are currently there lol

 

[Miller535]

Mark Levinson on meleves reef documented in his website how he did it. And he pulled out all of his clean up crew

 

[melanotaenia]

Basically pull everything except for fish as they won't be affected by medication, run interceptor in system and then do water change/carbon after application, redo treatment one week later, wait a few days, put inverts back in, all done. Make sure you have a scale so you can weigh out the correct amount of powder.

Check for bugs after second application when lights out with flashlight to verify you got them; a third application is sometimes needed but likely not necessary (I was able to nuke all of them with two treatments). I lost no corals from treatment and had no ill effect on algae growth or other adverse effects.

 

[Marc2952]

Basically pull everything except for fish as they won't be affected by medication, run interceptor in system and then do water change/carbon after application, redo treatment one week later, wait a few days, put inverts back in, all done. Make sure you have a scale so you can weigh out the correct amount of powder.

Check for bugs after second application when lights out with flashlight to verify you got them; a third application is sometimes needed but likely not necessary (I was able to nuke all of them with two treatments). I lost no corals from treatment and had no ill effect on algae growth or other adverse effects.

But doing water changes just makes the dinos bloom just do it anyway or run carbon to remove it?

 

[melanotaenia]

You can run carbon to remove without having to do the water change; I do weekly water changes so I just did the medication the day before my regular water change schedule.

I would however suggest a good water change and a couple days of monitoring after the last treatment before you put the inverts back into the tank.

The good news is that interceptor will definitely wipe the red bugs out and you should not have a problem after you nuke them (provided they don't get re-introduced in the future). Good luck.

 

[Marc2952]

You can run carbon to remove without having to do the water change; I do weekly water changes so I just did the medication the day before my regular water change schedule.

I would however suggest a good water change and a couple days of monitoring after the last treatment before you put the inverts back into the tank.

The good news is that interceptor will definitely wipe the red bugs out and you should not have a problem after you nuke them (provided they don't get re-introduced in the future). Good luck.

Sounds super easy thanks a bunch! Will update the results once i finish the treatment.

 

[Miller535]

One thing I would monitor (depending on your system), interceptor is a dewormer. If you have a lot of bristle worms, tube worms, and so on, you may experience a big die off and have a ammonia spike. Just food for thought.

And possibly sponges (I personally have a lot of those in my overflows and sump).

 

[Marc2952]

One thing I would monitor (depending on your system), interceptor is a dewormer. If you have a lot of bristle worms, tube worms, and so on, you may experience a big die off and have a ammonia spike. Just food for thought.

And possibly sponges (I personally have a lot of those in my overflows and sump).

Yea i have a ton of spones and spaghetti worms aswell as bristle worms. Will it also kill other beneficial bacteria that can cause dinos to pop out again?

 

[Miller535]

Yea i have a ton of spones and spaghetti worms aswell as bristle worms. Will it also kill other beneficial bacteria that can cause dinos to pop out again?

I don't know, I have never used it. I would think not, as it is classed as a broad spectrum antiparasitic drug and not a antibiotic, but I really don't know.