I need ideas for Sponge Predators

[Darsea]

Hi, I have a mysterious sponge growing rapidly in my tank. It's consuming my corals. Does anyone know of a natural sponge eater? Can anyone id this sponge? I've brought it to a number of LFS people to no avail. The concensus is that it is an encroaching sponge...

I've sent pictures to B. Fenner at wetwebmedia. His suggestions was to keep it away from my Corals. If I could do that I wouldn't have a problem now would I?

I even dared to remove the rocks out of the tank and let them die off...this is a hardly little sucker!

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Hopefully, there is a picture below. It is purplish, thick and rubbery

BTW, water parameters are ideal and have been for a long time. 75 gal with 30 sump.

 

[timthetoolman]

Not seeing the picture.
I have several kinds of sponge and no problems, that's weird. Do you have a good skimmer?

 

[timthetoolman]

Here you go:

And I retract my statement, these are nasty. I have some red version of this that suffocated a small hitchhiker clam:mad2:

 

[Darsea]

Thank you for posting the pic!

No, I've never used a skimmer, ok well, I have used one but not for the past 8 years or so. Does anything eat this goo?

 

[timthetoolman]

I've never heard of anything.

 

[LeslieH]

From your description and picture it could just as easily be an encrusting colonial tunicate. The animals that eat sponges and tunicates tend to be very specific feeders on one or a few types. First you'd have to find someone who could correctly identify the thing in your tank and then hope there's information on what eats it, and finally try to find that specific eater. Unfortunately neither the aquarium industry nor the state of knowledge about who eats what is that advanced. Removal by hand seems like your only option, sorry.

 

[Darsea]

Thanks, I think you're right about removing by hand. Unfortunately, so many corals are now glued to the rock I'm afraid I'm going to lose them one way or another.