i got bugs. help?

[llewoh05]

ok. so ive had what i thought to be bleaching sps coral for the last couple days. Ive done the standard "test everything" and water changes. Well it didn't stop. I have a pink acro, green slimer, and a nice milli plate starting to get an algae growth so i grouped them together and pointed a power head at them hoping the extra water movement would help. Well polyps started flying off them over the course of this week. So i am left with a slimer with NO polyp extentions. A pink acro thats is now completly white and a purple milli that is almost completetly white.

Yesterday i noticed little specks on them. After a much closer look guess what.....freaking red bugs. lol. my new tank has a pest. The only cure ive heard about is "interceptor". Anyone had experience with using this product? I got 3 pieces a few months back from a local reefer and everything was growing and looking great. Except for this past 1.5 week. They are smaller frags. Should i just toss them or is there any hope of saving? If i get rid of the sps will the bugs die out after a period? Ive got several pieces of LPS and zoos. Will the bugs affect them?

If needed i will get pics up tonight.

 

[llewoh05]

correction. i don't have any millis. i have a purple monti.

 

[karlm]

Two ways you can go. One: poison your tanks and kill off any crustions that you have, or two: you can get a Dragon Face pipefish the only known natural preditor for red reef bugs.

 

[Vitaly]

"Ive got several pieces of LPS and zoos. Will the bugs affect them?"

I have consistently read and been told that they are obligate acropora feeders and leave all other corals alone. So you should not seen any damage to the LPS or zoas.

"Should i just toss them or is there any hope of saving? If i get rid of the sps will the bugs die out after a period?

I think you should set up a quarantine tank and move all the acros to it. Hopefully all the Red Bugs will come with the acro, but move the corals quickly as I have read that they will release from corals and swim into the water column.

I would try to get my hands on some Milbemycin (sold as Interceptor) from your vet.

Melev (on RC) has a great website with info on all sorts of reef pests and nice discussions on treatment.

http://www.melevsreef.com/redbugs.html

Keep us posted.

 

[mangobusa83]

I had some on my staghorn at one time and talked to a vet and got some intercepter and got a lil 10gal tank and got the salin bout 1.027 ground the intercepter up and a maxi-jet 1200 and leave it in the tank for bout an hour to make sure it kills all the bugs completely ... just keep a close eye on it and make sure they are all off of the coral before you rinse it off and put it back in your display.. do not put the intercepter directly into your tank... you will lose every crab in your tank and maybe more.. but this is what I have personally done myself to rid the corals of the pesky lil yellowish "red" bugs.

 

[reefnut1]

They will not bother your zoas softies or LPS. I doubt if they will bother your digita.
But your acro is for lunch and the slimer is for dinner.

If you can remove them it is a good idea to dip them in Revive or something similar then put them back in. You will still need to use intereceptor or you will probably never be able to keep SPS. The good thing is it will only hurt your crabs. It will not bother your snails.

The dragon faced pipefish might help but I do not think it will get them all. Treating the tank is not hard and it works. You might get a pipefish after your treatment but they usually dont do well for the long term.

Did these corals start bleaching all at once? Red bugs is a slow process of damaging corals usually unless you have a very large amount of them.

 

[llewoh05]

Sorry fellas. I have been on holiday in KC, Mo for the past couple days. Perfect timing for this issue, right? Thank you all for suggestions.

[B
I would try to get my hands on some Milbemycin (sold as Interceptor) from your vet.

I called my vet and he is shipping me a couple doses of this stuff.

"
I think you should set up a quarantine tank and move all the acros to it.

Ive got a 10gal "quaratine" setup. Hopefully I will get the interceptor today and i can move the affected corals to it. Vet said they shipped on 12/30/09.

Two ways you can go. One: poison your tanks and kill off any crustions that you have, or two: you can get a Dragon Face pipefish the only known natural preditor for red reef bugs.

I think i will treat the 10gal and my main system. Better safe then sorry later. I do not want to leave anything standing. As long as it doesn't kill any of my corals. Screw the crustations. I don't have many anyway. I heard reports that many have low death rates. So i will take my chances. I might look into a pipefish.

Did these corals start bleaching all at once? Red bugs is a slow process of damaging corals usually unless you have a very large amount of them.

Yes they all started at once. Over the course of about a 1-2weeks.

Each night these things become covered in bugs so i take these corals out and spray/wash them with new saltwater in the sink till i get all the bugs out. I have been rinsing for almost 5 days now and more continue to show.

My main concern is these corals have been thriving in my system for several months. The "bugs" just sort of appeared. The only recent additions are 10 snails from Pet Supply. A few days after is when i noticed the infestation. You think they could have piggybacked on the snails?

 

[Horace]

Just wanna let you know that red bugs are likely not what is killing your corals. Despite what many think, they are typically very harmless, which is why many people have no clue they even have them. The only time they seem to be harmful is if the coral is already unhealthy for other reasons, and they seem to push to coral over the edge.

That being said, treating them is very easy and if I were you I would just try and get as many critters out as possible and do it. I used a full "large dog" pill on my 75g a while back... and repeated twice after that. Other times in the past i used less, and didnt repeat, and they just came back. Another thing I would like to note is this stuff really seems to be harmless to corals. I didnt even do the prescribed huge water changes and massive carbon addition and had zero fatalities, so really red bugs these days are not really any big deal.

Good luck!

 

[llewoh05]

Well the corals were looking great and growing like crazy until this started. The bleaching and red bugs just seem to fit hand in hand. I had no problems with these corals before this. I feel it is 2 late for my speciems so after this i might try again sometime later. LPS seem to be just about the only thing that flourishes in my tank.

So it "might" be safe to just add a full pill to my DT and let her rip? I have a 40gal breeder 20gal sump and 10gal refugium.

By adding, i assume dilute in say a gallon jug of RO and slowly drip into the display/sump. That correct?

Ill will try to get all the snails and crabs out tonight. So i can dose tomorrow. You think my small critters (pods n such) will die out?

 

[Horace]

for a 40, a whole pill might be overkill, perhaps go with a half. All I did was crush the pill up into a powder, then disolve in a cup of water and dumped it into my sump. Make sure you remove your carbon first, if you happen to use it. Then about 12 hours later (if you choose) just add some fresh carbon.

 

[Vitaly]

"Despite what many think, they are typically very harmless, which is why many people have no clue they even have them."

I am not an SPS guy...and this have little first hand knowledge of caring for these corals. But, all literature (eg. Shimeck, Sprung, etc) describes Tegastes acroporanus (the red bug) as parasitic to Acropora sp. By definition doesn't that make it harmful? If it were not harmful then would this not be a commensal or mutualistic relationship?

 

[mangobusa83]

the staghorn coral I had wouldnt grow at all til I dosed it... and I had it for about a year... it didnt kill the coral, it just had slowed its growth down to nothing

 

[llewoh05]

Well i did my first dose yesterday. I will be dosing 1/4 pill every 3-4 days. Procedure calls for 3 dosing but im gonna do 4.

I simply mixed the medication into a premade batch of saltwater. Then i slowly dripped into a high flow area in the DT. My little clown seems to enjoy it because it keeps swimming up into the path.

I left 1 small snail and mythrax crab in the DT to see what the effects would be and also because i waited 2 days to try to catch them and finally gave up. Hopefully they will live.

My corals developed a thin coat of algae over the weekend so i fear its too late for them. But i did notice a few bugs on them anyway. They mostly attack at night it seems.

This morning i noticed alot of small pods / shrimp die off yet still many running around. There were several dead floating in the DT. This was to be expected i guess. Can anyone think of a good way to get those dead ones out of the tank? i was thinking of setting up a net with a filter pad to barely skim the surface. What do you think? Otherwise fish and the above mention crustations are still alive.