colonial hydroids

[jet fixer]

Some of my rocks are infested with colonial hydroids I've tried manual removal, calc paste, and burying them under sand, they keep popping back. I'm thinking of replacing the rocks they are on. What would be the best way of doing this? I have a 10 gal OT I can set up. It would be very crowded with all the livestock in it plus, the filter is not established right now.

My plan is get some cured rock from someone breaking down a tank. fill the QT with tank water move as much livestock I can catch/fit into it. Replace the rocks and do a water change then move everything back. I also plan to test for ammonia daily for a week and have enough SW on standby to do a change just in case the levels elevate.

Do you think this is a good or bad plan? any alternatives I haven't thought of? I would really like to do this in a day, with my schedule I don't have alot of time.

 

[dublo8]

From what I have read they will go away with time on there own. Or you can syphon to your hearts content.


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[UberNoober]

after googling for pics, I had a couple of those on a mushroom rock in my tank. Went away about the same time as my couple pieces of aptasia, which makes me wonder if thats something the pepermints eat as well??

 

[evolved]

^ Some people have reported such.

 

[jet fixer]

Don't pep shrimp eat zoa's?

I first noticed them a year ago, How much time?

one sugestion I read was a blowtorch, don't want to go that nuts on the rock. one of the LBS guys said cooking the rock won't even get rid of them. so I'm going to get rid of those rocks. Right now I'm thinking of placing the new rocks in a bin with flow and add slowly.

 

[4218kris]

Don't pep shrimp eat zoa's?

I first noticed them a year ago, How much time?

one sugestion I read was a blowtorch, don't want to go that nuts on the rock. one of the LBS guys said cooking the rock won't even get rid of them. so I'm going to get rid of those rocks. Right now I'm thinking of placing the new rocks in a bin with flow and add slowly.

no peppermints dont eat zoo's

 

[OwenInAZ]

Peppermints will eat anything that is dead. So, if a zoanthid is dead, then presumably a peppermint will eat it. But not while still alive. It's the same thing when you hear people saying that they attack snails or crabs -- if a snail is dead it's fair game.

 

[4218kris]

Peppermints will eat anything that is dead. So, if a zoanthid is dead, then presumably a peppermint will eat it. But not while still alive. It's the same thing when you hear people saying that they attack snails or crabs -- if a snail is dead it's fair game.

yep, if its dead It's a whole other ball game.

 

[UberNoober]

Don't pep shrimp eat zoa's?

I first noticed them a year ago, How much time?

one sugestion I read was a blowtorch, don't want to go that nuts on the rock. one of the LBS guys said cooking the rock won't even get rid of them. so I'm going to get rid of those rocks. Right now I'm thinking of placing the new rocks in a bin with flow and add slowly.

No sir, my zoos are doing excellent.

 

[JMCAquarium]

picking derbis from between them more then likely,
Hydriods are bad new in mass they sting and can cause coral die off.
I used to use a tooth brush to get them off my rock when id find them. If you keep a good amount of flow they will not grow they hate flow

 

[mndfreeze]

There are nudi's you can get online that eat hydroids but like all are exactingly specific so you have to know exactly what hydroids you have.

 

[aztbs]

Are they the soft brown fluffy ones like this?

Or are they more like this with tubes:

The brown fluffy ones just grow on tiny little strings in a colony and they can multiply extremely fast. I have found that they are photosynthetic, so covering them up does work. I spread a Kalk paste on the colony and then wrap that piece of rock in a large sheet of epoxy putty. Looks like crap for a while, but it did work.
I tried hammering off the piece of the rock that they were growing on, but they would always come back because their little stringy roots went deep in to every nook and cranny. Miss even one little bit and they come back. Insidious little pests.
Manual removal leads to cups full of hydroids and no progress.

But they come back twice as thick

If you have the tube ones, they are actually jellyfish. Once they mature(which I don't think they do in the aquarium), the crowns will leave the tubes and become the free floating jellies. I had a few small patches of these, but they did not seem to multiply at all. In fact, they are sometimes neon green and kind of cool. You can easily get rid of these buy plucking the tube from the rock with tweezers. They are on there pretty tough though.

I never found any fish, shrimp, or nudi that would touch either kind.

 

[JMCAquarium]

Aww, you just summed it all up like a champ with pics to boot !!! really gonna miss ya

 

[EvilE]

Some of my rocks are infested with colonial hydroids I've tried manual removal, calc paste, and burying them under sand, they keep popping back. I'm thinking of replacing the rocks they are on. What would be the best way of doing this? I have a 10 gal OT I can set up. It would be very crowded with all the livestock in it plus, the filter is not established right now.

My plan is get some cured rock from someone breaking down a tank. fill the QT with tank water move as much livestock I can catch/fit into it. Replace the rocks and do a water change then move everything back. I also plan to test for ammonia daily for a week and have enough SW on standby to do a change just in case the levels elevate.

Do you think this is a good or bad plan? any alternatives I haven't thought of? I would really like to do this in a day, with my schedule I don't have alot of time.

Limpets eat Hydroids

 

[jet fixer]

The only thing I have done is isolate the infested rocks to the sump. Here is an older photo of they type I have.

They have spread to other rocks since the photo was taken. Some are deep inside crevasses and hard to get to. I'm going to research pep shrimp more before I do anything. If I swap/add out the rock I can reaquascape to make room for other corals.

 

[BowieReefer84]

Are they the soft brown fluffy ones like this?

Or are they more like this with tubes:

The brown fluffy ones just grow on tiny little strings in a colony and they can multiply extremely fast. I have found that they are photosynthetic, so covering them up does work. I spread a Kalk paste on the colony and then wrap that piece of rock in a large sheet of epoxy putty. Looks like crap for a while, but it did work.
I tried hammering off the piece of the rock that they were growing on, but they would always come back because their little stringy roots went deep in to every nook and cranny. Miss even one little bit and they come back. Insidious little pests.
Manual removal leads to cups full of hydroids and no progress.

But they come back twice as thick

If you have the tube ones, they are actually jellyfish. Once they mature(which I don't think they do in the aquarium), the crowns will leave the tubes and become the free floating jellies. I had a few small patches of these, but they did not seem to multiply at all. In fact, they are sometimes neon green and kind of cool. You can easily get rid of these buy plucking the tube from the rock with tweezers. They are on there pretty tough though.

I never found any fish, shrimp, or nudi that would touch either kind.

Best post I have ever read regarding hydroids. Thanks for this information with pics. I know this is an old post, but figure it may help someone else.

 

[Helfrichs Chic]

Jet I have those too, and the DO multiply! I've got quite a few patches and so far nothings worked. I've tried boiling RO water, manual removal and even tried joes juice on a whim. Next up I'm going to entomb them with the epoxy for holding LR together. My last idea. They seem to spread pretty slow so that's good at least.

 

[jet fixer]

About a month ago I used pliers to remove large chunks of rock where the hydroids were, as of today they have not returned. Still looking to add LR and Pep shrimp just for other reasons. I'm also looking for some extra time so I can take better care of my tank.

 

[KiLaGo]

When I first had these, I tried tooth brushes. A few months later I tried tweezers. A few months after that I tried pliers. Then I just let them go for 6 months and they spread and took over everything. I then decided to torch them. I've torched every rock in my tank 3 times over the past 6 months, they still come back. When I torched the rock, I heated them up fairly hot. 2 months later, a few pop up here and there. I give up on these guys. I am going to start fresh in a new tank with new rock, transfer what coral I can, take the rock from my old tank and then cook it in the oven at extreme heat for 5 hours and then put it back in my old tank and just watch it.

 

[mndfreeze]

I know they get worse in nutrient rich systems as well, like a lot of the pests we get in tanks.