Zoa pox...I think

jahmic

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
#1
I noticed 2-3 closed up polyps after adding some zoas to my tank, figured they were either just needing time to adjust, or being irritated. I dipped in CoralRX prior to adding them to the tank, and didn't notice anything out of the ordinary. The frag in question did tip over in its cup and the now closed up polyps were resting on the bottom of the cup, so I figured they were just annoyed.

3 days later they still haven't opened and there are a couple additional polyps not opening...my initial thought was amphipods irritating them as I spotted one on a closed up polyp, but yesterday I saw the tell-tale white "zits" on the stalks of the affected polyps. Also, the polyps never opened and closed throughout the day...the healthy looking ones have stayed open and the closed up polyps have remained tightly closed. I tried to blow the white spots off with a turkey baster and even tried a light scraping...they didn't budge so it's definitely not sand or detritus.

I'll try to get pics when I get home, but from the descriptions I've read online it's definitely sounding like zoa pox.

Since this is only a frag with a few affected polyps, would it be of any benefit to remove and toss the ones that are showing visible signs of infection, or should I just go ahead and dip these in Furan-2...which seems to be an effective treatment from what I've read. And on that subject...where the heck do I find this stuff in Denver? Called a couple shops and nobody seems to carry it [anymore].

I suppose this is my first lesson in why I should QT corals before adding them...glad it came early. I'll have to get a decent light for the 6-gal I have laying around so I can use it for a coral QT tank. Hopefully I can remedy this issue...I think this infection may decimate my confidence in reef keeping if it takes the colony out. :(
 

jahmic

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
#3
ailachami;151829 said:
fish palace in aurora has it. I bought one couple months ago.
I just tried calling there...and judging by the person's confusion on the phone, there's a chance that they were completely lost and didn't know what I was talking about...but I was informed they don't have any there. :(
 

amonchak

Administrator
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#4
I think I have some laying around I can check when I get home. I'll give you a pill or whatever they are called. PM me if you like and we can work a time for you to pick some up.
 

jahmic

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
#5
amonchak;151843 said:
I think I have some laying around I can check when I get home. I'll give you a pill or whatever they are called. PM me if you like and we can work a time for you to pick some up.
Thanks so much for the generous offer! I made a couple more calls and found a pet store in lakewood that has some in stock. Ironically, I hadn't gone back there since my first visit over a year ago because the tanks were in such sad shape...figures they'd be well stocked on fish meds, lol. I should be all set, but will definitely let you know if I end up heading home empty handed.

I'll do my best to keep this thread updated as I attempt to treat these zoas. FWIW, the tank conditions have been stable:

pH - 8.2
alk - 9
salinity - 1.024
ammonia/nitrite/nitrate - 0
...shamefully haven't tested phosphates, but running a GOOD skimmer slightly wet and have been doing 10-15% changes (RO/DI + aquavitro salinity) every 5-6 days
...also haven't tested Ca or Mg either. Perhaps it's bad form but since I'm not dosing either I figured there wasn't any point.

I'm thinking the corals were just stressed, which allowed this to take hold. The only thing that comes to mind is temperature fluctuations...I've been in the 77-81 range over the past few days since my metal halides warm the tank up during the daytime. I'm not running a chiller yet, but will try to bump up the thermostat on the heater to 80 (currently set at 78) to see if the tank can maintain 79-81 degrees instead. It usually heats up to 79 with just the actinic T5s on during "sunrise", then within a couple hours of the metal halides coming on it creeps up to 81 and holds there for the rest of the day. I'm thinking my house is cool enough (72 degrees ambient) that the tank dissipates heat well enough to stay below 81/82 even if I bump up the heater a bit to reduce the daily fluctuation. We will see.
 

jahmic

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
#6
Well, found the furan-2 and gave things another once over when I got home.

Visibly, it looked like zoa pox, but I decided to be just a little less cautious with my scraping, and all the spots came off fairly easily. Noob moment I guess, but it looks like it was just debris.

A bit relieved...but no change with the polyps, they're still closed up. I moved the frag to an area with some more flow to see if that helps. Also, dunno if it's possible for amphipods to irritate a polyp enough for it to remain closed this long, but I removed a couple I caught crawling around while inspecting and cleaning the frag.

The only other possible explanation I can come up with for this is allelopathy...there are 2 different types of zoas on one small frag. It started off where one morph was closed up while the other was doing fine...after a few days some of the other polyps on the "boundary" started to close up.

I'm going to give this a few more days and see what happens. I think I'll try to separate the colonies if things don't improve...and just cross my fingers that they don't get worse.
 

jahmic

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
#7
Exposed the zoas to air for 2 minutes yesterday and killed the amphipods that crawled out...guess I could've just dipped them again, but the plan was to just inspect them and out came the bugs.

All but a few polyps opened...and those appear to be closed up less tightly than before. Soooo relieved it wasn't something worse.

Anybody want some furan-2? Lol
 
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