"Uh-Oh I have AEFW"
- Thread starter PolandSpring
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swannyson7
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Repeated dipping in QT is tried and true, so that's probably your best bet. I've known a couple people that have managed to beat them with basting as brahm suggested, so I wouldn't rule that out completely either. Both require a great deal of diligence on your part and the basting is more likely to control them rather than eradicate them, although it is possible. The FWS is far too new to come to any conclusive results, but I'm interested to see what the masses are saying a year from now...
-Logzor
2500 Club Member
This remains true until a year later, they can potentially pop up again. They're quite sneaky. Picture a single AEFW surviving, it's going to take a long time to notice and reproduce enough to have a visual impact.
While basting is a excellent temporary solution, complete eradication purely with basting is highly unlikely. If they're actually free of them I'm suggesting another variable is at play, perhaps they have a type of wrasse that is actually eating AEFW off of the acros.
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brahm
Active Member
Unless you don't inform people first. You can get them from anywhere. All no additions should be dealt with as if they are infested.
brahm
Active Member
Spinning my wheels? My tank is growing very well. I kept them contained without loosing corals. I went from a demand of 36ml to 120ml of 2 part within 5 months. I don't think I would call that spinning my wheels.
brahm
Active Member
.. They aren't going to just vanish for a year and come back unless you re-infect yourself with the same bad practices that got you infected in the first place. A couple weeks sure, MAYBE a month max. But a year later..
I'm not here to debate with you about your tank; if you are happy with what you got fine, good for you. I still would never take the approach that you have.
I'd never be happy with my tank knowing that they could still be lurking in my system, even if they are kept at bay by basting or whatever...
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brahm
Active Member
er.. wanted to add this but it was to late to edit
Many of the other treatments are far to risky. I lost a lot of pieces dipping stuff at first until I figured out what I can and can't dip. Look at all the people that jumped on the levinsole band wagon and lost there ENTIRE tanks. Nothing happens quickly in this hobby (nothing good). I kept my tank going (and growing over the past year), now there is a supposed treatment out there that I am trying, and if I need to blast/baste once or twice a week (which I would do anyways to help with detritus clean up). It's no big deal, it's a good husbandry practice. But yes at times you do need to dip as well but I'm not going to rip apart my tank and do the same thing i can do in my DT in another tank with stressed out corals in a less stable system, and if you are just doing the treatment in another tank connected to your DT you still risk reinfecting your tank.
brahm
Active Member
I use both. Maxijet when I'm doing a water change or something on the tank but when I don't feel like plugging things in and getting my hands wet and I'm just staring at my tank after work or before bed I'll grab a turkey baster and baste around for good measure before I go off to do something else.
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WesF
Well-Known Member
I agree. The treatment is often worse than just living with them and controlling the population. Most of the AEFW horror stories we read about end with people killing all their corals with the latest experimental treatment of the month. There are many people who have been successfully living with AEFW for years by just doing regular bastings.
Here is one example:
http://reefbuilders.com/2012/04/10/sanjays-joshi-reef-tank/
He discusses it further in his reefkeeping TOTM article.
http://reefkeeping.com/joomla/index.php/current-issue/article/66-tank-of-the-month?start=1
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SteezySPS
Valuable Member
This is my obeservation after doing a massive dip today. I discoverd aefw beginning of April. Been using FWS since then. I still find eggs and aefw. One larger colony had over twenty aefw but the coral was nicely colored. All the eggs I discovered today were underneath the frag plugs and none on the acros although I did discover eggs on one acro a couple of weeks after initial treatment.
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PolandSpring
Valuable Member
The wierd thing is that when i dipped my sps last week i did not see any AEFW, however, i know i have them because just the other day i was inspecting my pieces again and found eggs on my tyree tri-color. I've only found eggs on 3 pieces: Tri-color, Red Table, Jesus stag.
I found AEFW (large ones) on my german blue polyp 2 weeks ago which caused me to start my AEFW dipping process for the next 6 weeks. Some of my sps are already looking better. The only losses i have had so far is my ORA Hawkins and my Tyree Fireball (from WT).
Is it wierd that i haven't seen any AEFW come off in my treatment of all my sps? i'll be doing another dip on sunday and let you guys know.
I found AEFW (large ones) on my german blue polyp 2 weeks ago which caused me to start my AEFW dipping process for the next 6 weeks. Some of my sps are already looking better. The only losses i have had so far is my ORA Hawkins and my Tyree Fireball (from WT).
Is it wierd that i haven't seen any AEFW come off in my treatment of all my sps? i'll be doing another dip on sunday and let you guys know.
spsaddict
Active Member
I thought I would chime in here because I have some experience with AEFW on the large scale. I work for a store that has good practices for quarantining new corals and they still sometimes make it through. All corals are dipped in Coralrx pro for a minimum of 10 minutes and inspected closely for eggs. If I see eggs I scrape them off with a dental tool. I add a relitivley strong powerhead to the dip container and just before I'm about to move the dipped coral to the rinse I blast it with the powerhead. From my experience if you have AEFW dipping every 3-4 days for 3 months is the only way to rid them completely. The gestation period for eggs to hatch is a minimum of 14 days and live flatworms can live for months given a steady food source, reproducing very quickly. AEFW without a food source can only survive about 5 days. With that said, if Flatworm Stop actually works it could be a great preventitive. There definitley are some acros that dont like dips like Turakis, echinatas, and some deepwaters and you may have to dip for less time and dip more frequently if you are qting. Dipping every 3-4 days is key as you are trying to kill them before they have a chance to lay more eggs. Just my 2 cents. Hope it helps.
neuwave
Active Member
+1 to this.
I had aefw and every 3-4 days I did exactly that. Dipped in revive since I noticed it coralrx wasn't getting them all. It was getting "some". Either way the eggs survive with either treatment. So with a led flashlight and a small razor blade I scraped off every egg cluster I would see. After three months of this, not a colony dead but red mili is slowly coming back. Haven't seen any aefw since March.
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PolandSpring
Valuable Member
Thankyou for that, it was very helpful
the way I was explained how FWS works is it makes the slime on the coral taste horrible so the AEFW won't eat it
essentially you give me a big juicy steak I'm eating it, you give me a big juicy steak that has been sitting in the bottom of a nasty, foul, trash can I'm gonna pass.
does it work? I dunno jury has come back with a verdict yet
essentially you give me a big juicy steak I'm eating it, you give me a big juicy steak that has been sitting in the bottom of a nasty, foul, trash can I'm gonna pass.
does it work? I dunno jury has come back with a verdict yet
