Help find acan eater and what is this?

[icu2]

So, this happens in localized colonies and will heal if left alone for now; wanting to find culprit.
Only inhabitants:

3 small hippos
2 mandarins
3 cleaner shrimp
4 neon gobies
2 other small gobies

one large bristle worm

Secondly, what type of worm makes this and ideas on what would eat it?
- the dirt looking things on pic - they are soft like held together with a mild adhesive

Thanks!

 

[iamwrasseman]

its not the fish listed IMO .try iodine dip and also interceptor will kill off any live critters that may be munching on your corals.

 

[icu2]

Will do -iodine dip and also interceptor-. Will this harm the acans? Is there a specific dosing regimen that should be considered?

I have been dipping in revive after munchings and that seems to fend off any secondary infection(s). Seems like a localized critter; forgot to mention that the maroon acan was fine and in close proximity to the orange one when it got munched. Moved the orange then the maroon got munched... I think I will tear apart that area looking tomorrow.

As for the small burrowing guys, they are a nuissance because they seem to make their presence known in the coral polyp itself or in between adjacent polyps - essentially anywhere on the live coral. I have removed the tubes and they are rebuilt within 24-48 hrs. Only way I have been able to eradicate is through physical removal with stainless; inadvertantly turning any evidence of the purpitrator into an undistinguishable mixture of mostly acan flesh and it.

 

[iamwrasseman]

well iodine dip should be on the bottle ,i also use coral revive but the interceptor is a bit different as you have to dose the entire tank . it will not hurt corals of fish but can harm inverts so dose after you are sure that the acans are in need of this and that the inverts are expendable . you can remove them for the dosing and it is 1 pill for a 50lb dog per 360 gallons . i would dose two times two days apart and then run carbon to remove it after a week .
personally i have never lost any inverts myself but some people have so i am just making you aware of the situation . also i have doubled and even tripled the dosage level with no ill effects .

 

[pluschinatown]

Did you try looking in the middle of the night with a flashlight? Maybe 2 hours after lights go off, if no luck then 4 hours after then 6 hours after and you should be able to find what is munching on it.

 

[RokleM]

That's typical symptoms of something (like a peppermint shrimp) attacking the mouth area for food. I agree that it's unlikely to be anything big like fish. Whatever it is appears to be targeting a specific area.

 

[icu2]

I will remove the cleaner shrimp (only shrimp in the tank) and see if they are the culprit as well as removing the bristleworm (large - as big around as a pencil). I will dip a frag in interceptor to see if there are any mini macro crustations causing issues and another frag in levamisole to see if it kills the worms (worth a shot).

 

[ritter6788]

You have more than one bristleworm, I promise. My blue hippo was a LPS muncher but I don't know if the centers would be chewed out like that. Mine chewed at the fleshy part on the outside. I guess it could be the shrimp, could be something else too small to see.

 

[mscarpena]

Shrimp or crab. Same thing is happening to my balsto, but I have no shrimp. I think I got a hitchhiker crab. Only happens about once per week.

 

[chumcrazy]

+1 to the shrimp I had a peppermint do it to one of my acans.

 

[icu2]

Cool they will be removed shortly. Revive has kept corals from getting infection after mouth eaten; they grow new mouths in ~ 1 week.

 

[njdevilsfan]

i think its a worm inside the acan eating it from within
iamwrasseman is right go with the interceptor

 

[iamwrasseman]

your eye will not be able to see what the problem is if the interceptor should be used .these bugs are super tiny and you wont see them . you will however see the damage they do .

 

[jmahfouz]

peppermint shrimp use to do that to mine.

 

[MechEng99]

If you're target feeding your acans, as mentioned before, shrimp/crabs love to grab the food out of the mouths - often resulting in damage to the mouths.

If you aren't target feeding, it's unlikely there is enough food in the polyps for shrimp to go after them and cause that sort of damage. I'd look for other causes (eunicid worm?).

The worms causing the "dirt" looking stuff between the polyps are probably a relative of vermetid snails. They're filter feeders that collect whatever they can catch with mucus strands - leaving a dirty look. I'm not aware of any dips to eradicate them - best method is manual removal and/or you can superglue over the tubes to prevent them from capturing food.

 

[smogl00]

Just thought I would chime in as well. I've just gone through a small epidemic of some kind of acan eater. Find my thread below, but the main point is that whatever was eating my acans, flatworm exit dosed to almost triple dosage is what finally slowed and killed it. There were no ill effects to any corals, fish or other inverts in my tank.

 

[PONCHDOG2000]

Shrimps and crabs will pick food out of acans...
I've had damsels, gobies and even clown fish irritate acans in the effort to make them spit up their food.

 

[lxwebb]

i found a hitch hiking crab that was eating acros down to nubs over night.
here is a link to a very informative website on hitchhikers.
http://www.chucksaddiction.com/hitchhikers.html

 

[Duronakus]

I’m going through the exact same thing , did you find a soloution , I’ve tried three bouts of the equivalent of interceptor In the uk , I’ve been regularly dipping with melefix/revive/lugols , I’ve had a lab test done to eliminate any levels out of whack, some of my acans look exactly the same as above , lots of little wierd pods come off with every dip seen some come out of the burrowing holes , all I’m doing is regularly dipping , only time I lose something totally when it gets a secondary bacteria infection

 

[RRA]

+1 to the dip,

By chance do you feed them super heavy daily? I have found that when that is done and the coral is not given enough time to digest the coral it can rot in its mouth and cause something like this.