PPE problems... whats going on in this photo?

Blitz · Mar 20, 2007

a few weeks back my PPE's and RPE's closed up... i've since moved both corals to different areas of the tank (trying to get to the cause of it) and in doing so cut my halides this weekend to nothing, only ran 110 watts pc actinic over my 24x24x24 tank...

i also moved the ppe's under a ledge to provide shade for when i start running halides again.

they opened back up a little which i'm happy about but...

this is a picture of them... notice the nobby blister thing on the top polyp... what is that?

Kigs! · Mar 20, 2007

I had a similar blister like infections run through some of my colonies. What are your water parameters like? They started to occur when my flow was low, and my nitrate high, and my pH low. See if you can isolate the infection, and if it gets worse, try to save the healthy polyps before they spread further.

reefboy · Mar 20, 2007

definatly move to a high flow area looks to be infection similair to zoapox and a higher flow will help them fight it off.

Pufferpunk · Mar 20, 2007

I thought palys didn't get the pox?

reefboy · Mar 20, 2007

i said similair to pox but its a bacterail infection just the same just figuring what caused it may be a prob because these are usaly secondary infections from stress.

Kigs! · Mar 20, 2007

agreeing with jody...regardless of what you this might be 'called,' you should place it under high flow and watch it closely to avoid further spread.

http://www.zoaid.com/articles004.php

also do a search on here for zoa infections

ficklefins · Mar 20, 2007

Check your tank a few hrs after the lights are off. I have the same exact thing going on in my tank and I realized that some very large pods were making a meal of my PEs. I didn't believe it when I saw it the first time so I waited another hour or so and they were back again! They are attacking my zoas and PE frags that are on the sand bed near rocks or on rocks themselves.

The other day I suspected that something was picking on a different PE frag so I moved it up to a frag rack and hit has recovered really well. I know plan on making a frag rack and moving all my zoas and palys off the sandbed and rocks.

I started a thread about it here:
http://www.club-zoa.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=3212

ficklefins · Mar 20, 2007

I took some pics this morning and hopefully this will explain the situation a bit.

The pic on the left is a frag that was being eaten by pods. Pics are a bit unclear sorry.

#1 Arrow showing that most of the disc is missing and a part of the polyp is healing with what looks like a bald bulb like thing.
#2 This polyp is pretty much gone. Just a tiny shrivel of a mess.
#3 This polyp is just a bald bulb with no signs of a skirt or oral disc.
#4 Closed up and not too happy.

Pic on the right is the same exact zoa type right next to that other frag. The only difference between the two is that this frag is extending out a bit from the rocks and not sitting flat on the rock. You can see the frag disc in the upper right corner are the polyps from the first pic.

I can say for sure that there is no difference in flow or lighting. Only difference is night time predation by pods.

d.grcich · Mar 20, 2007

My pods leave my zoa's alone untill some start doing bad them whamo they are all over them. I thought it was a secondary reaction and the pods were taking care of the rotting tissue but ficklefins might have me looking at it a different way now.

Azurel · Mar 20, 2007

I have had them do that stuff to perfectly healthy RPEs infact 3 frags worth. My newest frag they started on it about 3 weeks after it was in the tank so I moved it up to the frag rack and they have started to grow again......

MarvinsReef · Mar 20, 2007

man.. both the PPE issue and the pods thing is mond boggling.. I dunno really what to say.. I've seen some of my PPE's do that sometimes.. most of the time, they bounce back from it.. as long as the polyps still look healthy but just closed, they normally come back after several days or a week or two.. I've had a PPE polyp closed for 2 months and came back strong when it finally opened..

the pod thing.. man, if that is true, that's a little scary coz most of us have these in our tanks.. I think my wrasses do a pretty decent job of maintaining their population though... I don't see any big ones running around at night when I check w/ flashlight or LED... actually, I don't see too many around..

Azurel · Mar 20, 2007

IF you think it is a bactrial infection then try some furan2....I did it on a 3 frags that had what looked to be pox and it worked quite amazingly....

JGoslee · Mar 20, 2007

My pe's were looking the same way. After reading Ficklefins thread on pods I realized that my mandarin and 6-line wrasse were in QT. For 8 weeks I had my fish in quarantine and my pe's suffered. Now that my mandarin is back on the hunt my pe's look great.