Isopods-A tank death sentence?

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Barry69

New member
After wonderful success over the past 3.5 weeks with all sorts of life, 2 starfish, Copepods, and other neat things, I got up this morning to notice a new "bug". I tried to get a pic but he was just too fast....I'll try and explain best I can.

The bug was about 1/4 inch long, transparent color, moved to fast to see how many legs or tentacles. It jumped and swam so fast like there was no water in the tank to slow it down. I noticed another small one similar to it. I think the small one may have buried himself in the sand. He kind of reminded me of those silver bugs you see when you pick up a piece of wood but these guys are clear.

So, searching around Im thinking they might be Isopods :mad2: :sad1:

I have read that there is no getting rid of them and they will kill everything alive in your tank. Only thing you can do is remove everything and wait 3 months until they starve. But that still doesnt guarantee more will not hatch out of the live rock.

I dont know what a baby mantis shrimp looks like but I dont think its that.

If anyone has any ideas please let me know :(
 
Where on earth did you read this? Pods are GOOD. Your fish will eat them, and the pods will also eat algae and junk from your rocks. People *buy* pods to add to their tanks. :)

Tracy
 
Some Isopods are very BAD!!! Check out my gallery and you will see one attached to my Percula Clown sucking the life out of him. Here is the way I got rid of them.
I got a piece of 1/2" pvc and attached a hose to it to use as a siphon. Isopods only hunt at night in the dark but they do not see the color red. I put a red filter in front of a flashlight and hunted them at night with all of the lights out except the flashlight. Start a siphon with your tube and put your finger over it. when you see an Isopod, move the tube slowly towards it. when you get real close, let your finger off of the siphon and suck it up the tube and into a bucket. It took me a couple of nights to get about a dozen of them. I have not seen any in about two years.
If they are the bad Isopods get em out quick and hope you get them all. Be persistant with your hunting and you will be just fine. It does not mean the death of your tank but it does mean that you have some work to do.
Good luck and hope this helped you out.
 
Try your best to capture one, get a close up picture of it on a white piece of paper from a couple different angles, then post on here for help in ID'ing it. Many isopods are not a danger to our tanks. I had isopods in my 26g in the past and they did nothing damaging. For awhile, they were everywhere, then they just dwindled away and didn't come back. From what I've seen on ID sites, it's usually the ones with really big eyes that are the dangerous ones, the smaller-eyed ones are usually not problematic. I know that's kind of generalizing there, but was how it looked. I know there was an article somewhere on these things, I'll try to find it.
 
amphipods are good: at 1/4 inch, that could still be an amphipod, and they're fast when the light comes on. Do you see molts floating about? That's usually the case with them.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11753362#post11753362 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Shooter7
Try your best to capture one, get a close up picture of it on a white piece of paper from a couple different angles, then post on here for help in ID'ing it. Many isopods are not a danger to our tanks. I had isopods in my 26g in the past and they did nothing damaging. For awhile, they were everywhere, then they just dwindled away and didn't come back. From what I've seen on ID sites, it's usually the ones with really big eyes that are the dangerous ones, the smaller-eyed ones are usually not problematic. I know that's kind of generalizing there, but was how it looked. I know there was an article somewhere on these things, I'll try to find it.
Click to expand...

actually the article that shooter just linked to has a good identification chart in it:smokin:

:smokin: shooter--good article
 
IMG_5824_zpsd788c367.jpg
[/URL][/IMG] Any advice on this critter. Thanks in advance.
 
zotzer said:
Where on earth did you read this? Pods are GOOD. Your fish will eat them, and the pods will also eat algae and junk from your rocks. People *buy* pods to add to their tanks. :)

Tracy
Click to expand...

I have two clowns that aren't touching them. They are over populating my tank.
 
Top one looks troublesome to me but the long thin one with legs out the the sides, that one is a herbivore Isopod called a munnid. They eat troublesome hair algae, and other algae. They are no trouble at all until you run out of algae. Then they irritate your coral so your coral secretes slime, which it will eat instead. They can bug a soft coral like a Kenya tree to death pretty quickly by stressing it out. So they are not dangerous but are a pain. I am having the same issue. From what I read though, when their food supply is gone long enough, they start to die off too. Meandering gobies will eat them, but once the population dies, your goby starves. Better just to let them die. Or you can buy a six line wraps, but they are not compatible with everything so check carefully.
 
Bad isopod

Bad isopod

I decided to try my luck with a saltwater take so we bought a biopod 29. The LFS set me up with 20lbs of live rock, a bag of live sand and 2 small clown fish. After a few days we added a flame back angle, a neon goby, a green chromis, a small blue hippo tang and 2 cleaner shrimp. After the second night I woke up to a dead blue hippo tang and a dead fire back! The blue was really stressed the whole time but the angle was really healthy from the get go. Next day the really healthy chromis was dead. Water tests were great and I was at a loss but thought maybe an issue with the LFS I got the fish from. Anyway why warrantied the blue and angle so I got another blue and a sailfin tang. Shorty after transitioning to dusk my blue was picking at my live rock when she backed up and was swimming really fast and I noticed a bug stuck to her face! It quickly attached to her underside. I think I found what killed my other fish! I was able to catch the blue and remove the isopod. I don't have another tank but I did remove my live rock for now and checked the sand as best as I could. I will try to attach a pic of the isopod on my blue.

How can I clean the live rock to be sure there are no other bad critters in it? I have put the live rock into 5 gallons of saltwater for now.
 
Well only a couple of your fish are suitable for a 29, let alone in a group (the tangs individually are 250+ gallon fish, they will literally be the same size as your 29 cube as adults). Read the new-to-hobby stickies. I doubt there is anything wrong with your rock.
 
I know nothing about these bad Isopods but is your tank a 29g tank? Please do more research on appropriate fish. No tangs should go into that tank. A hippo needs around a 180g from what I've read. Even if these fish survive the bad Isopods they will soon become stressed and probably die anyway.

Sorry not trying to lecture. No matter what I wouldn't be adding any more fish until you figure this problem out. Sounds horrible.

Good luck.
 
Try a fresh water dip on the live rock with RODI water for 5 minutes in a separate bucket,,youll see everything jump off in a hurry,,watch so you dont harm the beneifical bacteria and any corals attatched.
 
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