sponges. Too many? What eats them?

[TangerineSpeedo]

I would go with the Nudi... They are very specific in their diet and beautiful. So if you have a sponge eating Nudi its not going to go after your corals after it goes thru the sponges. But you have so much sponge it will probably go thru it life cycle before it finishes them. But the trick is finding the proper one AND acquiring it. because a sponge eating Nudi is a pest! (OMG call congress we must pass a law) <--- see what I did there...
If you want to check out some amazing Nudi's look no further than @ankezoid on insta. such amazing macro Photography

 

[Susan Edwards]

What size tank?

240 gal. About 220 total water volume

 

[AydenLincoln]

240 gal. About 220 total water volume

That’s great then because if you do get a starfish you can get any starfish you aren’t limited due to tank size I’d definitely recommend getting a reef safe one. Know that it’s a toss up for what they decide to eat and they are super sensitive creatures. They aren’t clownfish who will eat almost everything including their own poop lol.

 

[i cant think]

See, I would have gone straight to the turtle

I did that, it didn’t do too badly I’d say think a 5 gallon would be best for these guys don’t you?

 

[Derrick0580]

<<A few predator examples:
- Marine angelfish
- Moorish idols
- Sea turtles
- Some starfish
- Some nudibranchs>>

I have one angel fish-coral beauty. Doesn't seem interested. Any suggestions on starfish that are reef/coral/invert safe? And nudi's need other food, right

I wanna know where I can get a sea turtle!

 

[i cant think]

I wanna know where I can get a sea turtle!

Maybe you can ask your LFS? I don’t know, I got mine from a tank break down.

But in all seriousness why would you want to get rid of sponges?
Here’s one I have in my sump that’s been thriving for god knows how long. Some of her babies that make it into the tank will then thrive and the rest become fish food. Although I do have a CBB, two Halichoeres wrasses and a foxface.

I just find them to be a spare bit of live fish food that adds another bit of variety in their diet along with what appears as a million aquilonastra stars and pods (Copepods & Amphipods).

 

[Derrick0580]

Personally the sponge that grows in my tank I hate the look of. i get it is a sign of a healthy tank but it reminds me of the pink goo from ghost busters that reacts to people being angry! It’s a translucent pink and it has grown up all around the bases of my hammers on just one particular rock in my tank. This is a rather large patch, the rest are smaller than a dime and scattered randomly.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Larger angels will consume these but some yellow species are toxic.
you can inject them via syringe with vinegar or air and they should shrink
Scraping away works but best done outside the tank in a container of tank water

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

There certainly are a few types of sponge that can thrive in reef aquaria to the point of becoming pests, but I don't think the yellow ones in the pictures typically fit that description and I'd personally not do anything to get rid of those. I like the look of them.

 

[bnord]

I had hundreds of pineapple spunges then I got dinos when I used dino x it killed all of my pineapple spunges but it killed my birdsnest too.

That happened ( the sponge wipe out) to my tank in the one and only Chemiclean effort I had, except it was a manage colony of white tube sponges. Several experienced reefers said it was a coincidence, I do not think so

I have them now (a year later) extensively spread through the media chambers in the sump, but not in the display (that I can see)

Has a colony in a zoa island in a 15 a while back and thought they were cool at first, but started choking out the zoas, so pruned them by hand and now they are gone

As to silicates, clearly they need them to spread, and I have high silicates which come from my well water supply; 5 stage and carbon block knocks them down, but not out. So I go back and forth as to their value to my system - they are a silicate sponge after all

 

[Dkmoo]

I dont know what will eat them but I can tell you what will alleviate it in the future. Qs you mentioned in the other thread your tank is relatively young and you have no other filter feeders. Since you dose phyto, pods, and I'm assuming also feeding coral, you have very nutrient rich water. The sponges have no other competitor for this food so naturally it grows, and that's a good thing.

A word of caution if you do go the "removal" route, something else could replace it and some of them can be much worse and actually harm corals, like hydriods. Id do it slowly while also introduce some other good filterfeeders at the same time. - featherdusters, spoinid worms, clams, barnacles, vermatids etc.

 

[OfficeReefer]

Yeah, rocks in to stay lol's. I brought the sponges in from old tank on that first rock. Thanks on the plate. So a syringe with h2o2 shot into them? I imagine a bit at a time so not a big die off.

Yeah, that's probably the easiest to do. I had the same issue with a zoa and a piece of pukani that had a yellow sponge hiding out.

 

[OfficeReefer]

Out of curiosity, do you know which starfish eat sponges?

Then, you may find you have a starfish problem and require harlequin shrimp. This is what happened to me.

 

[ISpeakForTheSeas]

Just to put this out there - the problem with using biological controls (i.e. something that eats it) with sponges is that there are a ton of different sponges, some of which look indistinguishable from others. Some of these sponges are inedible or extremely undesirable foods to some species (either because of chemical defenses* or just because of taste preferences) while being highly desirable to other species. So, even if you pull in a known sponge-eating species of fish/starfish/whatever, there's no guarantee it will eat the sponge you want it to eat. Also, many of these sponge-eating species eat other things (like coral) that you might not want them eating.

Long story short, manual removal is probably your best option for sponges until more study has been on both specific sponges and specific sponge-eaters, but you can try it if you want.

*Just as a note on the chemical defenses of sponges, many sponges produce chemicals to avoid being eaten. Some of these chemicals are more generalized, some of them are specifically anti-fish, some are specifically anti-echinoderm (starfish, urchin, etc.), etc. So, again, some things might eat one sponge but not another, and because of the whole indistinguishable thing mentioned above, the sponges that are and are not being eaten may look pretty much identical (some may be distinguished/ID'ed under microscopic investigation, others may need to be DNA tested to be distinguished/ID'ed).

Just my two cents here.

 

[Pkunk35]

I’m not sure it will eat your specific sponge, but I believe this red starfish (I don’t think it is a linkia and it is commonly available) eats sponge or tunicate type growth in my tanks. I have rotated it between my two tanks to keep it fed bc it cleaned out my 32g of that type of growth. Seems quite hardy to me for a starfish and is totally reef safe but probably prone to starving once it has wiped out its food source.

as said earlier too, manual removal from the gsp and other colonies should be done asap imo until the spread is resolved (the sponge does look cool tho!!)

GL!

 

[Susan Edwards]

Maybe you can ask your LFS? I don’t know, I got mine from a tank break down.

But in all seriousness why would you want to get rid of sponges?
Here’s one I have in my sump that’s been thriving for god knows how long. Some of her babies that make it into the tank will then thrive and the rest become fish food. Although I do have a CBB, two Halichoeres wrasses and a foxface.

I just find them to be a spare bit of live fish food that adds another bit of variety in their diet along with what appears as a million aquilonastra stars and pods (Copepods & Amphipods).

trouble is they are taking over rocks with corals on them. I think they are too happy!

 

[Susan Edwards]

Larger angels will consume these but some yellow species are toxic.
you can inject them via syringe with vinegar or air and they should shrink
Scraping away works but best done outside the tank in a container of tank water

I can probably pull off the "dripping" hanging bits. I can't remove the rock. Or rather, that 1 rock I can but it is too close to the "spheres" that are too fragile if bumped (they break) so I won't remove rocks for this reason. With this tank being 25" deep and me a short person (read short arms) any "deep reaching" is iffy lol's

 

[Susan Edwards]

There certainly are a few types of sponge that can thrive in reef aquaria to the point of becoming pests, but I don't think the yellow ones in the pictures typically fit that description and I'd personally not do anything to get rid of those. I like the look of them.

thanks Randy. The only coral being affected are the gsp rock but I guess the gsp will manage. The rhodactis on the first rock also don't seem bothered. There is one near my gonipora that I don't want to smother though so will watch that one!

 

[Susan Edwards]

That happened ( the sponge wipe out) to my tank in the one and only Chemiclean effort I had, except it was a manage colony of white tube sponges. Several experienced reefers said it was a coincidence, I do not think so

I have them now (a year later) extensively spread through the media chambers in the sump, but not in the display (that I can see)

Has a colony in a zoa island in a 15 a while back and thought they were cool at first, but started choking out the zoas, so pruned them by hand and now they are gone

As to silicates, clearly they need them to spread, and I have high silicates which come from my well water supply; 5 stage and carbon block knocks them down, but not out. So I go back and forth as to their value to my system - they are a silicate sponge after all

I did a chemiclean treatment in May and it didn't affect them at all. Neither did the reef flux.

 

[Susan Edwards]

I dont know what will eat them but I can tell you what will alleviate it in the future. Qs you mentioned in the other thread your tank is relatively young and you have no other filter feeders. Since you dose phyto, pods, and I'm assuming also feeding coral, you have very nutrient rich water. The sponges have no other competitor for this food so naturally it grows, and that's a good thing.

A word of caution if you do go the "removal" route, something else could replace it and some of them can be much worse and actually harm corals, like hydriods. Id do it slowly while also introduce some other good filterfeeders at the same time. - featherdusters, spoinid worms, clams, barnacles, vermatids etc.

good point. Maybe I deal only with the ones that threaten my favorite corals, like my goni (there is one growing below it). I have vermatid snails unfortunately. I am ordering some cleaner clams and will get some feather dusters.