Berghia Nudibranch Vs. Zoa eating Nudibranch

[Zooxanthus]

Ok so in october of 13 I bought 2 Berghia Nudibranchs I only had a few aiptasia at the time but figured might as well make a preemptive strike. I threw them in the tank and havent seen them since. A few days ago I saw one sliding across one of my rocks that has a bunch of zoas on it. I thought to myself "oh good they are still alive." Then today before my zoas opened up i noticed round egg sacs on the stalks just like the egg sacs from the Berghia's. I quickly looked it up and realized that these were zoa eaters!! I contacted the vendor i bought the Berghias from and they told me that they only eat aiptasia when i asked them how to tell them apart from the zoa eaters she told me that the Berghia are bigger. Iam just wondering if shes telling me the truth. They look Identical to me even have the same curly egg sac.

Also wondering if anyone out there has had sucess with manual extractions. I have been plucking them out with a julians thing. Any info on either question would be greatly appreciated.

 

[ali1]

I bought a number of berghias and cant find them in my tank now. The one time i did see a berghia, it was in my zoa colony, but nothing happened to my zoas. If im not mistaken, i believe its normal for them to hide underneath zoas to hide from predators.

You will know if they are zoaeaters if you begin to see colonies closing up on you. Give it some time and check polyp count

 

[Zooxanthus]

After watching closely today I have seen them biting the heads and closing them up for a few hours at a time, now when i see a closed polyp I look and sure enough there is one biting its head. On the plus side its helping me find them, every time a polyp closes I can get another one out.

 

[temple2101]

I had an issue with zoa eating nudis and with patience I was able to pick them out manually. Been about a month and haven't seen them. Took a couple weeks to get to that point.

 

[Yogre]

My first thought was that the OP had Berghia hiding in the zoas. In that case, I'd leave the eggs alone, they are necessary for effective aiptasia eating colonies.

But from the later posts, it looks like the vendor may have sold mislabeled nudis.

Berghia will not eat zoas, they are obligate aiptasia eaters.

 

[rcmike]

Or possibly the ones you are seeing came in with some zoas and the berghia have died out? Not saying that is what happened, just another possibility.

 

[ali1]

Freshwater dips of your zoa colonies helps get rid of the zoaeating nudis. You can see them fall off one by one

 

[Zooxanthus]

well i spent all day picking them out and I don't see any zoas closing up. there are however little white specks on the highly infected colonies. pretty sure they are babies, so i think a freshwater dip is in order now. Thank you all for the tips and information!

If there are berghia still in the tank wold rather not take them out. Does anyone have a difinitive way to tell them apart? size is kinda relative when your dealing with generations...they all look the same, and they all have different sizes lol.

 

[Kona26]

not sure if you still have the aiptasia problem anymore...but what worked for me and still is was getting a matted file fish. I had alot in my tank and in about 3 weeks he mowed them down.