Acro Eating Flat Worms
- Thread starter DyM
- Start date
Re: Acro Eating Flat Worms
Sorry to hear of this disastrous challenge Dave, I hope you get it under wraps soon. Have you by chance tried any of the RPS all out? http://www.reefpestsolutions.com/#!rps-all-out/ctb5 I know Nick (ambrosio aquatics) has some and It might be worth a shot on some clippings or frags in a separate QT so at least maybe you can save some. I have no experience with flat worms, but I have used RPS with no complaints, but again no pests found either to verify success. Just offering another solution to try.
Sorry to hear of this disastrous challenge Dave, I hope you get it under wraps soon. Have you by chance tried any of the RPS all out? http://www.reefpestsolutions.com/#!rps-all-out/ctb5 I know Nick (ambrosio aquatics) has some and It might be worth a shot on some clippings or frags in a separate QT so at least maybe you can save some. I have no experience with flat worms, but I have used RPS with no complaints, but again no pests found either to verify success. Just offering another solution to try.
Re: Acro Eating Flat Worms
Hey Dave..been wondering what you have been up to...sorry to hear it was this.
I have a couple new 40B and 20L tanks if you need to borrow tanks. You can even borrow the 125 if you wanna go extreme QT. Also have some BRS clear screen you can have to keep the wrasses in.
Call me if I can be of any help and I'll come right over.
Hey Dave..been wondering what you have been up to...sorry to hear it was this.
I have a couple new 40B and 20L tanks if you need to borrow tanks. You can even borrow the 125 if you wanna go extreme QT. Also have some BRS clear screen you can have to keep the wrasses in.
Call me if I can be of any help and I'll come right over.
If you use Bayer, remove colonies and dip them... rinse them well, return them to tank... may have to repeat in a couple days.... the only bad effect i have seen from using bayer is a lack of pods..... after you have eradicated the flatworms, run carbon for a month and then repopulate with pods... Bayer will kill off any invert you have if you dont rinse it away well enough..do not dose it direct into your tank...
Today I’ll do a temp cover with a more permanent one in the works. Having a bow front with all kinds of extruding cables and plumbing makes a cover that looks good a challenge. Still, I’ll have something to prevent wrasses from exploring the kitchen floor. I’ll stop by and pick up a few wrasses from Nick (Ambrosio Aquatics) today, and follow up with Khalis today for the lubbocks fairy wrasse. That should be enough from the fish department. Thank you both for the great pricing on the fish, and reaching out to me, I really appreciate it.
Smiley and CindyL - I completely understand about the bayer dip, and have read the same that residual dip can wipe out pods and wreak havoc in the display. I plan on setting up a row of buckets, first for the dip, next four to provide multiple rinses.
I followed jda123’s advice yesterday evening and turkey basted all my acro’s. There was such a knot in my stomach when I saw all the flat worms coming off. The fish will be in there this evening and I’ll start the dipping on Wednesday.
Chad, I’ve read up on RPS, and it does not work on eggs as advertized. Several real world tests show it’s just another dip. Bayer at least can be used for the yard when I’m done.
Thanks though for the recommendation.
Thank you Swanny, reeftankulous, Andrew_bram, sethsolomon, jagermeister, jda123, Dr.HarlemTutu, and 09bumblebee – on you wrasse knowledge. Your input into this thread saved me a lot of exploring and hearing your personal experience made all the difference.
Also thank you CindyL, jda123, asneiman, Haddonisreef, and WatercolorsGuy for the offers to help with equipment, frags, or otherwise. It’s great to know help is there when needed.
Smiley and CindyL - I completely understand about the bayer dip, and have read the same that residual dip can wipe out pods and wreak havoc in the display. I plan on setting up a row of buckets, first for the dip, next four to provide multiple rinses.
I followed jda123’s advice yesterday evening and turkey basted all my acro’s. There was such a knot in my stomach when I saw all the flat worms coming off. The fish will be in there this evening and I’ll start the dipping on Wednesday.
Chad, I’ve read up on RPS, and it does not work on eggs as advertized. Several real world tests show it’s just another dip. Bayer at least can be used for the yard when I’m done.
Thanks though for the recommendation. Thank you Swanny, reeftankulous, Andrew_bram, sethsolomon, jagermeister, jda123, Dr.HarlemTutu, and 09bumblebee – on you wrasse knowledge. Your input into this thread saved me a lot of exploring and hearing your personal experience made all the difference.
Also thank you CindyL, jda123, asneiman, Haddonisreef, and WatercolorsGuy for the offers to help with equipment, frags, or otherwise. It’s great to know help is there when needed.
It sounds to me like you've got a good solid plan in place. Wishing you the best of luck with this. Please, keep us informed on your progress.
Helping each other (and commiserating when we haven't got much help to offer) is the reason we're here. I'd hate to see a tank as great as yours get taken down.
Helping each other (and commiserating when we haven't got much help to offer) is the reason we're here. I'd hate to see a tank as great as yours get taken down.
Labor or Love
This feels like work, but I chopped and dipped everything today. Pics don't look like much, but I don't have the heart to take pics of all the already dead and die-off I chopped off. Think though the regression has turned the corner as over the last two days no more RTN, and a few corals I thought were goners, seems to be hanging in there. This slimmer to the left covered the whole area, now there is space. Next time in 5 days when I pull the larger ones out again, I'll take pics. Surprisingly, there weren't as many AEFW's in the Bayer dip than I expected, for all the corals, about 100. I found 5 corals that had eggs, and about 10 that had signs of being chomped. Spent a lot of time looking and removing eggs since it should help get rid of these quicker.
Acropora Valida - Tricolor (LOST)
Acropora Tenuis - Blue (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Acropora Hyacinthus - Red (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Acropora Millepora - Pink (LOST)
Acropora Millepora - Cream (LOST)
Prostrata Northstar - Pink (LOST)
Acropora - ORA Red Planet (SOME BITE MARKS)
Acropora - Purple Monster (A LOT OF BITE MARKS AND EGGS)
Acropora - GARF Purple Bonsai (SOME BIT MARKS)
Acropora Tortuosa - Oregon Blue Tort (BITE MARKS AND EGGS)
Acropora Turaki - Blue (but looks green) (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Acropora Yongei - Green Bali Slimer (BITE MARKS AND EGGS)
Acropora Granulosa - Purple Monster (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Acropora - Blue Tip (Almost gone, hanging in there)
Acropora - Pink Lemonade (LOST)
Acropora - Stuber Staghorn (LOST 2 big colonies, hardest hit coral, last piece is hanging in there)
Acropora - Red Dragon (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Acropora Hydnophora - Green Hairy (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Coral to the front left you can see all the spots - those are bite marks.
To the left you can see the last victim - that was a great looking Tricolor
This feels like work, but I chopped and dipped everything today. Pics don't look like much, but I don't have the heart to take pics of all the already dead and die-off I chopped off. Think though the regression has turned the corner as over the last two days no more RTN, and a few corals I thought were goners, seems to be hanging in there. This slimmer to the left covered the whole area, now there is space. Next time in 5 days when I pull the larger ones out again, I'll take pics. Surprisingly, there weren't as many AEFW's in the Bayer dip than I expected, for all the corals, about 100. I found 5 corals that had eggs, and about 10 that had signs of being chomped. Spent a lot of time looking and removing eggs since it should help get rid of these quicker.
Acropora Valida - Tricolor (LOST)
Acropora Tenuis - Blue (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Acropora Hyacinthus - Red (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Acropora Millepora - Pink (LOST)
Acropora Millepora - Cream (LOST)
Prostrata Northstar - Pink (LOST)
Acropora - ORA Red Planet (SOME BITE MARKS)
Acropora - Purple Monster (A LOT OF BITE MARKS AND EGGS)
Acropora - GARF Purple Bonsai (SOME BIT MARKS)
Acropora Tortuosa - Oregon Blue Tort (BITE MARKS AND EGGS)
Acropora Turaki - Blue (but looks green) (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Acropora Yongei - Green Bali Slimer (BITE MARKS AND EGGS)
Acropora Granulosa - Purple Monster (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Acropora - Blue Tip (Almost gone, hanging in there)
Acropora - Pink Lemonade (LOST)
Acropora - Stuber Staghorn (LOST 2 big colonies, hardest hit coral, last piece is hanging in there)
Acropora - Red Dragon (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Acropora Hydnophora - Green Hairy (COMPLETELY UNEFFECTED)
Coral to the front left you can see all the spots - those are bite marks.
To the left you can see the last victim - that was a great looking Tricolor
I started a thread about reef pests that briefly touched on AEFWs...turns out there was also a more in depth article on them in the same issue of Reef Magazine:
http://www.reefsmagazine.com/forum/...-coral-killers-acropora-eating-flatworms.html
http://www.reefsmagazine.com/forum/...-coral-killers-acropora-eating-flatworms.html
Quick recap, in May 3013, a pest infestation of the dreaded acro eating flatworms (AEFW) was discovered. In attempts of eradicating the pest, several colonies, small colonies, and frags were lost. As far as time, in addition to the normal 3-4 hours spent in maintenance a week, 8-10 hours extra per week is spent. Really. So after researching, and having gone through this process 5 times – here is a summary of the 8 WEEK routine I followed (today will be treatment 6 of 8):
Monday: Make up 35 gal of fresh salt water
Wednesday:
(a) Corals were dipped and treated in 4 gallons of dip solution (I have large colonies that needed this much water to fully cover the coral).
(b) 3 cups of Bayer (10ml per cup) was mixed in with salt water
(c) Additional 2 buckets were used for rinsing (about 4.5 gallons each)
(d) Corals were placed in the dip bucket for 15min. I would move the water around and use a new turkey baster to squirt water around the coral every 5 min or so. (Note the water is milk colored so you can’t see anything in the water)
(e) Next I pull the corals out with one hand, pass it to the other hand, and then place coral in the rinse bucket.
(f) Leave the corals in the rinse bucket for 15min, go wash your hands – I didn’t use a glove until the last 4 dips, hindsight would be to use the elbow high glove whenever you put your hand in the dip. It is poison after all. The only issue is it’s hard to grab corals and awkward to maneuver.
(g) Now pass to the next rinse bucket, let sit for another 15 min
(h) The rinse solution was only used once. When coral was in the second rinse bucket, I would dump the water from the first, and add another 4 gallons of fresh new salt water
(i) The same coral dip (d) was used each time, but I had enough coral for three buckets full of treatments so steps e-h was done a three total times
(j) When coral was passed from the last rinse bucket to the display tank, the coral was scrutinized for eggs, I scraped and broke corals to get to the eggs – purpose in all this is to stop the spreading and propagation of the pest
Saturday: Blast corals with turkey baster, stopped after 4 weeks.
Observations/Lessons: I’m sure there will be more….
*** After the first dip, as reported in many other threads, I too noticed a lot of pods floating (dead) around the reef. Also, 2 fire shrimp and 1 banded coral shrimp were docile, and acted very different for days. They didn’t die, and came back. The principle culprit I suspect is when you rinse the frags after the dip/treatment, you just don’t swirl the coral in the clean water, leave it in there for 15min. Subsequent dips didn’t have this effect.
*** For the dip or rinse water, some weeks it was freshly made salt water, others it was from my tank (water changed) – just thought I’d point that out
*** Why 8 weeks? Eggs take 20 something days to hatch. After the third treatment, I did not see any eggs on any of the coral I was dipping. This is such an elaborate effort, wanted to do everything in my power to ensure I got them all.
*** It’s common when dipping colonies to have some tips bump and break, be cognizant that hanging tips are removed. This can happen too when placing the coral back into the tank; ensure any small pieces are taken out and removed. This ensures a food source for AEFW isn’t present so you can break the cycle.
*** After the initial dip, found it very difficult to determine if I saw AEFW or just debris from basting with a turkey baster. Not sure if it helped, but sure led me to feel better when I didn’t see confirmed AEFW, but I wouldn't count on it. I say this because after the first dip, I noticed new eggs on some of the corals, and the eggs are in some difficult areas where basting or fish would seem impossible to get at. I know basting doesn’t get eggs, but an AEFW can be in the smallest of crevices, meaning a perpetual cycle of pest and eggs. I didn’t blast Mon-Wed for sure - wanted any AEFW to be on the coral so when dipped = dead. The rational to stop halfway through was the pests are really small. The full grown adults are clearly large and identifiable. How good of swimmers are these guys? If based off of the acro, how long would it take for it to find a new one acro coral? How long can it live without food? I felt that basting may have perpetuated them to be in areas I wouldn’t dip or get to. If they are on the acro, the dip would get them for sure.
*** I feel a good portion of losses are from the stresses put on the SPS coral during chopping, moving them, placing them in new areas of flow and light, this dipping process, and from the coral being weak from the parasite. My thoughts are unless a complete stable environment is available for QT, each item (temp, alk, calc, etc) is an additional stress factor on the coral. I didn’t pull all the corals out into a separate quarantine. Instead, treating all acros outside my display and putting them back into the display. For me, a completely separate setup was not an option. For one I didn’t have the setup and equipment to house about a third of my reef (which are acros) in a stable environment for months. Big corals were in the reef for years, and use to the lighting, flow and routine. I felt it was best to change as little as possible.
*** SPS coral show no stress from the Bayer dip, slight color loss was observed from corals that didn’t have AEFW but I feel that is from stress as mentioned above. The corals that had a lot of AEFW damage showed considerable improvement, and more color – obviously less stressed than having the life sucked out of it.
*** Since most acros were fully encrusted on large rocks, it was pain to take the corals off the rock, and be certain no acro was left encrusted. This is important as any acro left behind would be food and a breeding ground for new AEFWs. I went through two tubes of the red 2 part mix epoxy to ensure no acro was left on any rock.
*** Large colonies dislodged from their spot don’t return well to the reef. I often found flow or a fish would push - knock them over. Sometimes into an acan or other coral that was happy to send out tentacles to kill the sps that touched it. Some of the reason to chop off sections of coral that had eggs was later to make the colonies smaller. It was painful, but getting though this was my goal. Often I would lean corals into corners and onto the glass.
*** A few lost frags were my fault. I initially decided to dip garlic pills which killed the AEFW's and unfortunately, also killed the corals within two days after the dip. Don’t try the garlic route (http://wamas.org/forums/topic/33942-lanmans-acropora-eating-flatworm-aefw-thread/#entry292680). I was hoping to find an in-tank solution but that failed miserably. My assertion was garlic is feed to the reef in some cases for fish health and to help with Ick. Why then can’t garlic than be used as an in tank AEFW treatment? I now know why not.
*** At the end of all this, I plan to reseeded my reef with pods and rotifers as I know they had to take a hit, I don’t see many.
MURPHEY’s LAW – here are some stupid things that went wrong:
>>> Week one, I got really sick, and it was the worse week given having to separate off the corals, treat, and address a lot of corals falling and such. I bought 3 fish from Nick, (only 6 –line made it) and later stiffed Khalis, I had to separate from the forums and focus, but I hate stiffing anyone, so publicly need to apologize to Khalis.
>>> On treatment 3, while making the 35gal of fresh water, I have the output of the RO/DI and the float switch bracket long enough to go to the Brute trash can to make and shut off water production. In my stupidity, I forgot to move the float switch out of the sump, and into the Brute, so the RO.DI kept making water = 10 gal of water on the floor when I came back from work. I about lost it and this was the first time I thought about quitting… that lasted 5 min, and then cleaned up the water.
>>> I made screens for my tank, what a PITA. Finally got something to work, but knocked them in several times to find they get caught in SPS near the top. Not fun for sure
>>> Treatment 4, decided to take pictures, but left my camera on the ledge of my display. I knocked my camera into my reef when taking out a big colony. My focus was on the coral, so I didn’t realized it was completely submerged for a good 1-2 minutes. Camera was removed, dried out for two weeks, and …. Doesn’t work. Bye bye camera.
None of what or how to dip outlined here is new, I only added a few more weeks as I’ve read folks dipping for 6 weeks and I explained above why this extension was added. I learned a valuable lesson throughout this process. Dipping is easy, quarantining for a minimum of 4 weeks isn’t. We all know keeping parameters consistent is a key ingredient for a reef to be at its best – and things go south fast when things are out of whack. Having a separate stable setup is something I’ll solve before adding a single coral into my reef. AEFW are completely preventable, and likely to get through dipping. Reef keeping is truly a constant learning experience and often knowledge gained from failure is invaluable. This made me a better reef keeper for sure, but knowing this could have been avoided hurts. I’m still going through this so I REALLLLLLY hope to report back in 2-3 months I’m pest free. Fingers crossed for sure.
Here are some of the better threads that helped.
http://www.ultimatereef.net/forums/showthread.php?t=630520&page=11
http://www.marinecolorado.org/forums/showthread.php?15944-Advanced-Dip-for-Reef-Pests&highlight=Aefw
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2263491
Monday: Make up 35 gal of fresh salt water
Wednesday:
(a) Corals were dipped and treated in 4 gallons of dip solution (I have large colonies that needed this much water to fully cover the coral).
(b) 3 cups of Bayer (10ml per cup) was mixed in with salt water
(c) Additional 2 buckets were used for rinsing (about 4.5 gallons each)
(d) Corals were placed in the dip bucket for 15min. I would move the water around and use a new turkey baster to squirt water around the coral every 5 min or so. (Note the water is milk colored so you can’t see anything in the water)
(e) Next I pull the corals out with one hand, pass it to the other hand, and then place coral in the rinse bucket.
(f) Leave the corals in the rinse bucket for 15min, go wash your hands – I didn’t use a glove until the last 4 dips, hindsight would be to use the elbow high glove whenever you put your hand in the dip. It is poison after all. The only issue is it’s hard to grab corals and awkward to maneuver.
(g) Now pass to the next rinse bucket, let sit for another 15 min
(h) The rinse solution was only used once. When coral was in the second rinse bucket, I would dump the water from the first, and add another 4 gallons of fresh new salt water
(i) The same coral dip (d) was used each time, but I had enough coral for three buckets full of treatments so steps e-h was done a three total times
(j) When coral was passed from the last rinse bucket to the display tank, the coral was scrutinized for eggs, I scraped and broke corals to get to the eggs – purpose in all this is to stop the spreading and propagation of the pest
Saturday: Blast corals with turkey baster, stopped after 4 weeks.
Observations/Lessons: I’m sure there will be more….
*** After the first dip, as reported in many other threads, I too noticed a lot of pods floating (dead) around the reef. Also, 2 fire shrimp and 1 banded coral shrimp were docile, and acted very different for days. They didn’t die, and came back. The principle culprit I suspect is when you rinse the frags after the dip/treatment, you just don’t swirl the coral in the clean water, leave it in there for 15min. Subsequent dips didn’t have this effect.
*** For the dip or rinse water, some weeks it was freshly made salt water, others it was from my tank (water changed) – just thought I’d point that out
*** Why 8 weeks? Eggs take 20 something days to hatch. After the third treatment, I did not see any eggs on any of the coral I was dipping. This is such an elaborate effort, wanted to do everything in my power to ensure I got them all.
*** It’s common when dipping colonies to have some tips bump and break, be cognizant that hanging tips are removed. This can happen too when placing the coral back into the tank; ensure any small pieces are taken out and removed. This ensures a food source for AEFW isn’t present so you can break the cycle.
*** After the initial dip, found it very difficult to determine if I saw AEFW or just debris from basting with a turkey baster. Not sure if it helped, but sure led me to feel better when I didn’t see confirmed AEFW, but I wouldn't count on it. I say this because after the first dip, I noticed new eggs on some of the corals, and the eggs are in some difficult areas where basting or fish would seem impossible to get at. I know basting doesn’t get eggs, but an AEFW can be in the smallest of crevices, meaning a perpetual cycle of pest and eggs. I didn’t blast Mon-Wed for sure - wanted any AEFW to be on the coral so when dipped = dead. The rational to stop halfway through was the pests are really small. The full grown adults are clearly large and identifiable. How good of swimmers are these guys? If based off of the acro, how long would it take for it to find a new one acro coral? How long can it live without food? I felt that basting may have perpetuated them to be in areas I wouldn’t dip or get to. If they are on the acro, the dip would get them for sure.
*** I feel a good portion of losses are from the stresses put on the SPS coral during chopping, moving them, placing them in new areas of flow and light, this dipping process, and from the coral being weak from the parasite. My thoughts are unless a complete stable environment is available for QT, each item (temp, alk, calc, etc) is an additional stress factor on the coral. I didn’t pull all the corals out into a separate quarantine. Instead, treating all acros outside my display and putting them back into the display. For me, a completely separate setup was not an option. For one I didn’t have the setup and equipment to house about a third of my reef (which are acros) in a stable environment for months. Big corals were in the reef for years, and use to the lighting, flow and routine. I felt it was best to change as little as possible.
*** SPS coral show no stress from the Bayer dip, slight color loss was observed from corals that didn’t have AEFW but I feel that is from stress as mentioned above. The corals that had a lot of AEFW damage showed considerable improvement, and more color – obviously less stressed than having the life sucked out of it.
*** Since most acros were fully encrusted on large rocks, it was pain to take the corals off the rock, and be certain no acro was left encrusted. This is important as any acro left behind would be food and a breeding ground for new AEFWs. I went through two tubes of the red 2 part mix epoxy to ensure no acro was left on any rock.
*** Large colonies dislodged from their spot don’t return well to the reef. I often found flow or a fish would push - knock them over. Sometimes into an acan or other coral that was happy to send out tentacles to kill the sps that touched it. Some of the reason to chop off sections of coral that had eggs was later to make the colonies smaller. It was painful, but getting though this was my goal. Often I would lean corals into corners and onto the glass.
*** A few lost frags were my fault. I initially decided to dip garlic pills which killed the AEFW's and unfortunately, also killed the corals within two days after the dip. Don’t try the garlic route (http://wamas.org/forums/topic/33942-lanmans-acropora-eating-flatworm-aefw-thread/#entry292680). I was hoping to find an in-tank solution but that failed miserably. My assertion was garlic is feed to the reef in some cases for fish health and to help with Ick. Why then can’t garlic than be used as an in tank AEFW treatment? I now know why not.
*** At the end of all this, I plan to reseeded my reef with pods and rotifers as I know they had to take a hit, I don’t see many.
MURPHEY’s LAW – here are some stupid things that went wrong:
>>> Week one, I got really sick, and it was the worse week given having to separate off the corals, treat, and address a lot of corals falling and such. I bought 3 fish from Nick, (only 6 –line made it) and later stiffed Khalis, I had to separate from the forums and focus, but I hate stiffing anyone, so publicly need to apologize to Khalis.
>>> On treatment 3, while making the 35gal of fresh water, I have the output of the RO/DI and the float switch bracket long enough to go to the Brute trash can to make and shut off water production. In my stupidity, I forgot to move the float switch out of the sump, and into the Brute, so the RO.DI kept making water = 10 gal of water on the floor when I came back from work. I about lost it and this was the first time I thought about quitting… that lasted 5 min, and then cleaned up the water.
>>> I made screens for my tank, what a PITA. Finally got something to work, but knocked them in several times to find they get caught in SPS near the top. Not fun for sure
>>> Treatment 4, decided to take pictures, but left my camera on the ledge of my display. I knocked my camera into my reef when taking out a big colony. My focus was on the coral, so I didn’t realized it was completely submerged for a good 1-2 minutes. Camera was removed, dried out for two weeks, and …. Doesn’t work. Bye bye camera.
None of what or how to dip outlined here is new, I only added a few more weeks as I’ve read folks dipping for 6 weeks and I explained above why this extension was added. I learned a valuable lesson throughout this process. Dipping is easy, quarantining for a minimum of 4 weeks isn’t. We all know keeping parameters consistent is a key ingredient for a reef to be at its best – and things go south fast when things are out of whack. Having a separate stable setup is something I’ll solve before adding a single coral into my reef. AEFW are completely preventable, and likely to get through dipping. Reef keeping is truly a constant learning experience and often knowledge gained from failure is invaluable. This made me a better reef keeper for sure, but knowing this could have been avoided hurts. I’m still going through this so I REALLLLLLY hope to report back in 2-3 months I’m pest free. Fingers crossed for sure.
Here are some of the better threads that helped.
http://www.ultimatereef.net/forums/showthread.php?t=630520&page=11
http://www.marinecolorado.org/forums/showthread.php?15944-Advanced-Dip-for-Reef-Pests&highlight=Aefw
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2263491
