Aiptasia control

[fishypets]

I've got some aiptasia that could get out of control if I don't act. I think I remember someone on this site with a nudi that ate the little suckers. Anyone know where to find one and what it's called?

Clint

[Will]

burghia i believe

[fishypets]

Will you are correct. Does anyone have a few Berghia nudis for sale or rent?

[+o0zarkawater]

I've had pretty good success with Aiptasia-X and peppermint shrimp.

I have a jumbo sized bottle of Aip-X, and could spare you some if you want to try it on them without dropping 15$ on your own bottle.

[offroadodge]

deftntly worth gettn under control, they will drive u crazy trying to kill them once they start spreading. Ampt-X workd the time i used it in my old tank.

[JeffT]

I had a few small aiptasia that I kept battling with. I would squirt them with vinegar, which would knock them out, but I would find more later.

I picked up 3 good size peppermint shrimp from Mama and have not seen an Aiptasia in my tank since.

[fishypets]

Thanks for the info guys. Will my wrasse kill the peppermint shrimp?

[+o0zarkawater]

Thanks for the info guys. Will my wrasse kill the peppermint shrimp?

Some wrasses will, depends on the size of both.

My spotted hawkfish will kill peppermints in a heartbeat, and he really isn't even all that big

[caferacermike]

I've never had good old Kalk paste fail me. Works on aptasia, majano, as well as zoas, paly's and mushrooms.

Mix it up thick with just a touch of water, suck it up in a small syringe (no needle) and apply with all pumps stilled. Wait about an hour before restarting pumps. In the morning they will all be dissolved.

[Mike M.]

Copper band butterfly and a Leatherback(aka Aptasia Eating Filefish)-both good options for a predator style approach outside of the usual peppermint shrimp technique. I enjoyed my Leatherback tremendously...cool community fish. No trouble to anyone in the tank. Yellow tang hassled my Butterfly incessantly and most likely contributed to its early demise. It ate brine shimp and everything! So anyway, those are two good alternatives to approaches mentioned above. I'm also an Aptaisia X user and like the product.

Mike

[fishypets]

Normally I'd like the butterfly fish but John at Kingfish had one that developed a taste for expensive acans. No thank you! I'm going to pick up a few peppermints today and see what they do. If that doesn't work I'll order a few nudi's. Although chemical warfare may be the quickest and most effective the size of my tank and the rock stucture make it hard to reach the big ones. I'll keep everyone posted.

[Crab Rangoon]

If that doesn't work I'll order a few nudi's.

If you add the Berghia, please make sure to do one/both of the following:

1) turn some of your bigger powerheads off

2) dial large powerheads down

I've had far too many friends and customers purchase & acclimate them, only to have them get vaporized by a Tunze/VorTech/MaxiJet/Korallia That being said, if you purchase the Berghia, do be sure to get an adequate number of them for your size aquarium. It should be pretty easy to resell them to somebody else after you're done, to ensure they keep doing their job & do not starve to death. There is always somebody in town with Aiptasia who could benefit from helping the little guys food supply, and help you recoup some of your cost

[JamesL]

+1 for the Aiptasia-X. Normally peppermints worked for me. But I had an angel that would bully them, so they just hid most of the time.

[fishypets]

If that doesn't work I'll order a few nudi's.

If you add the Berghia, please make sure to do one/both of the following:

1) turn some of your bigger powerheads off

2) dial large powerheads down

I've had far too many friends and customers purchase & acclimate them, only to have them get vaporized by a Tunze/VorTech/MaxiJet/Korallia That being said, if you purchase the Berghia, do be sure to get an adequate number of them for your size aquarium. It should be pretty easy to resell them to somebody else after you're done, to ensure they keep doing their job & do not starve to death. There is always somebody in town with Aiptasia who could benefit from helping the little guys food supply, and help you recoup some of your cost

Good point Randy @ 12,000 GPH of flow these guys wouldn't be my best bet.

I'm going to try the aiptasia X and get a few peppermints. Thanks for all the great ideas guys.

[innate1]

I'm with Mike on the kalk paste works great

[chrisfowler99]

I've got one spot that appeared the other day. Gonna grab a few peppermints on my way home today. We'll see if anything thinks they're a snack.

[+boognish]

+1 on the combination punch of pepps and Aiptasia-X.

I had 3 king size on my old rock and 2 small aiptasia on a zoa rock a friend gave me. I picked up 5 peppermints from mama and the small ones were gone in a week when the pepps finally decided to come out. I dropped Aiptasia-X on the king size ones and they immediately died. They suck it in like it's food, then just sit there and die. They don't have a chance to squirt out any of that crap (I hear it's actually it reproducing when threatened), or suck back in and hide in the cracks. I read some bad things related to the aipt-x, but they seemed like isolated cases of certain types of fish eating it and getting sick. I saw no ill effects to any coral in the vicinity, nor to my blenny. I just turned off flow/circ so it wouldn't go anywhere I didn't want it, then used another syringe to remove any excess before turning flow/circ back on. The next morning, there were hermits and emeralds hanging out around the hole one of the king size ones was in - eating the remians, I assume - and they are all still alive also.

[Derek]

Aiptasia X works well. Personally I prefer a good copperband butterflyfish. They are pretty and take care of the problem.

[GKarshens]

Clint you sound like a noob. I personally prefer Tropic Marin's aiptasia killer. Peppermints worked for me until I got my Mystery Wrasse and he ate them all.

[prof]

The commercial aptasia products work great but are usually very similar to kalc paste. They usually add vinegar and/or some sort of 'food' to keep the kalc in suspension and to make the product more paletteable.

I've always gone after the large ones with kalc paste and let peppermints do the rest. Copperbands are great if you can keep them alive. They have a very high mortality rate.