Levamisole In-Tank Treatment for AEFW

Nothing kills the eggs as far as I know.

James - have you had a chance to test the prohibit or are you still not finding worms to test on?
 
Well, in my case after a first treatment PO4 went up from 0.03 to 0.18ppm :((((

My PO4 went from 0.04 to 0.09 on my first dose. I siphoned out as much death as I could.

I have some bad news to report.. During my second treatment, I blew off the SPS with a MJ1200 and saw no flatworms in the process.. At the end of the treatment right after my WC, I decided to go at them one more time with my turkey baster and these B@stArd$ started flying of a couple of my colonies.. I was able to collect a few and dropped them into my remaining mixture of levamisole and after a few seconds, they peeled off the container and died... My guess is that the dosage is not strong enough.... That bothers me because I'm not sure how much stronger a dose the other inhabitants can take... I'm a little apprehensive about the next treatment... Any advice would be greatly appreciated..

I had tons that survived the first dose as well... Lotsa of small ones likely from newly hatched eggs but there were plenty of adults also.

Flamron just a side note, I wouldn't dip with the bayer product if you are concerned with only AEFW, revive or coralRX will work just as well. From what I have seen the only advantage to using bayer is that it could kill red bugs.

I tried the Bayer dip last weekend specifically for AEFW as I don't have red bugs. Went with the recommended dose of .5 ml of Bayer to 2 cups tank water...Never phased the AEFW. So then I doubled the dose. Still nothing. Finally I tripled the dose...still not even phased. It did however kill all the pods and asterinas pretty quickly. I have abandoned this method for AEFW at this time. I may consider the recently mentioned dose of 10ml Bayer to 4oz water for 5 mins at a later time just to test it out.

Just as an update to all those who read my post that I found live adults after treatment, I was able to catch a few and put them into my remaining levamisole treatment.. They literaly turned to mush! it did not stun them, it did not knock them out... It killed them.. Finding the proper strength to treat is key... great advice Bax on bumping dosage at .5 pertreatment and backing off if necessary.

Good to know ^^^ I'm still on the fence on whether I'm gonna resume the rest of the full system tx of Levi (Prohibit).

In the meantime I have resorted to the traditional method of dips of coral rx every 3-4 days. I used 15 drops/ 32oz rather than 30 drops/g of tank water as the label recommends. Tons of FW dying/ dead.
 
Cato - I'm with you on the "standard" dose of Bayer - it was worthless. I do wonder what those guys were killing. Possibly regular planaria? Anyways, I tested out 5ml and 10ml in 1/2 cup (4oz) of water and the 10ml is a good dip to kill the flatworms I have.

Also - are you abandoning the Prohibit in-tank treatments because you don't think it is working? Or is it the PO4 jump? Would an increase in Prohibit possibly cause issues that you want to avoid? Perhaps jumping it up the .5g would allow you to find the dosage that needs to work? I would recommend testing in a small container with a couple frags and some worms to see where you need to be to have an effective treatment. That is my plan when I get my prohibit and scale - next week hopefully.

It may be a good idea to employ some GFO during the treatments if PO4 is going to jump. When/if I treat, I'll test my PO4 with my Hanna handheld (not super accurate, but should be a good indicator).
 
I used the recommended dose of Beyer as a dip on some frags andhad some AWED fall off almost immediately but it did not kill them. I will continue to use this as my primary dip solution
 
Cato - I'm with you on the "standard" dose of Bayer - it was worthless. I do wonder what those guys were killing. Possibly regular planaria? Anyways, I tested out 5ml and 10ml in 1/2 cup (4oz) of water and the 10ml is a good dip to kill the flatworms I have.

Also - are you abandoning the Prohibit in-tank treatments because you don't think it is working? Or is it the PO4 jump? Would an increase in Prohibit possibly cause issues that you want to avoid? Perhaps jumping it up the .5g would allow you to find the dosage that needs to work? I would recommend testing in a small container with a couple frags and some worms to see where you need to be to have an effective treatment. That is my plan when I get my prohibit and scale - next week hopefully.

It may be a good idea to employ some GFO during the treatments if PO4 is going to jump. When/if I treat, I'll test my PO4 with my Hanna handheld (not super accurate, but should be a good indicator).

I may try the Bayer dip with your numbers for all new stuff I get.

I got a bit nervous with my first Prohibit dose. I dosed 9 grams Prohibit for my 500gal system. Fish seemed somewhat stressed and went into hiding for about a day and a half. My system is a new upgrade as of Dec so every coral is pretty much frags or sm colonies and easy to work with with the dip process. Just leery about killing my fish. Everything seemed somewhat normal within a couple days following dosing though so I am getting my courage back to dose again. I followed Baxs method of medication dose. I added up the container volumes of my display, sump, frag tubs = 500g. I didn't subtract for rock, sand etc. I also didn't baste the corals during treatment though so maybe that had an effect overall.

My system is bacterial driven (Prodibio) also and I measured PO4 with my Hanna meter so there is a +/- 0.03 error deviation possible too. I didn't measure trates but I'm sure there up more than previous (was undetectable).
 
It sounds like you may have came close to your critical dose. Do you see any more worms after basting?

My plan is to go with 2.5 grams since I have a 120g display and a 40g sump. That should get me in the ballpark anyways, and I'll be able to adjust from there.


Here is another thought: perhaps the initial three treatments should be closer than 6 days. If these flatworms truly do grow quickly, then there is a risk that we may time it to where the eggs hatch and have enough time to lay again. So maybe a 3 day window between treatment 1 and 2, and possibly the third - depending on coral reaction.

Or is six days a good enough estimate to say that they aren't maturing in that time frame? If I get frisky, I may set up my 2g with a few worms and a couple frags and see if I can breed them to try to determine their gestation period. Matter of fact, I'll go do that real quick (in theory anyways).
 
I'm on my second dose today. SO far, I have not seen any worms coming off the sps! After my first treatment, I did lose some sps corals, but only the ones that have been stressed and not healthy. The sps that made it are all very healthy with great polyp extension.
 
From Venezuela

From Venezuela

hi, I am from venezuela so it will be a little bet dificult to find by name a medicin with levamisole so what can you tell me to help me find it here? what component it must have other than levamisole or not have?

do this treatment kil other pests like red bugs? nudi ? or how knows, also ich?
or is it only for AEFW??? Interceptor is only for red bugs? or is it good for AEFW too? so many questions sorry... thank you
 
Well, no luck getting any flatworms to test with. I only got one to blow off that I saw and my melanarus ate him quicker than I could catch him.

I'll keep trying, though. I may give it a go tonight when the main lights are out.
 
Nothing kills the eggs as far as I know.

James - have you had a chance to test the prohibit or are you still not finding worms to test on?

I haven't been able to do any testing on worms, I have been dipping but only have found one or two lately.
 
Has anyone else tried dipping in hydrogen peroxide mixed with tank water? I did this to take care of some hair algae and had a cali tort with bite marks on it, big aefw came off, didnt see any eggs. I tried this with zoas/palys and lps and havnt lost a single coral and no more bite marks and great polyp extension. Plus this stuff is even cheaper than bayer. The way to do it is to slowly add it... you will notice flatworms, pods etc will freak out and keep adding a little more until they are dead. I will try this again soon and measure how much I use to be more accurate.
 
It sounds like you may have came close to your critical dose. Do you see any more worms after basting?

You could be right.

Anyway I decided to treat a second time yesterday. So far so good. Stuck with 9 grams Prohibit again for 6hrs. Fish seem to have dealt with it a bit better this time. Didn't see any AEFW at all even after basting. None.

Anyone have any idea what the half life of the active ingredient is? Just curious how long it takes for the med to finally rid the system.
 
From what I've read, it has the potential to leach from the rock if left in the system. I'd run carbon on the heavy side after each treatment and do a water change as well.

Glad to hear you are having luck cato.

On a side note, I've basted for the last three days and have gotten zero flatworms to blow off the tricolor or mille that they have been most prevalent on. I'm hoping their numbers are really low and I can knock these buggers out with a few treatments of Prohibit. My shipment will hopefully be here by the end of the week.
 
Treatment #3 went in yesterday.. I used 5grams on my est 225 gallons of water and turned the skimmer off this time.... Fish made it through ok. I used my turkey baster throughout the treatment and noticed only one medium sized flatworm dislodge very early in the treatment. I did not notice any additional flatworms after basting throughout the rest of the treatment.. This was an imporvement from the second treatment.. Hopefully there numbers are breaking down.
 
Thanks for the update Jonathan.

What was your dosage the second time? Did you increase it X grams this time? If so, what was your upped amount?
 
I received 5gram prepared packs from "inkmkr". The first two treatments, I mixed the whole five gram packet, but only dosed 75% of the mixture to come close to the treatment for my water volume.. I may increase it by .5 grams the next treatment.
 
update for the fourth dose
Dosage 5.5gram/500gal
total volume, included rock and substrate.
Result,
after basting corals, all PE retracted,
fish are more nervous, hiding more, one newly added chromis died one hour after treatment
acan and clams retracted after one hour treatment. when skimmer was on...
Conclusion,
Dosage at 5.5 gram is strong...I would not increase more than 5.5gram/500gal total volume...
Look like skimmer might have a positive effect on levi treatment, don't know why since after turn on skimmer, clam close their mantel and fish were more nervous, acans retracted....
Do not add any new fish when tank is in treatment or fish are in bad health...
 
update for the fourth dose
Dosage 5.5gram/500gal
total volume, included rock and substrate.
Result,
after basting corals, all PE retracted,
fish are more nervous, hiding more, one newly added chromis died one hour after treatment
acan and clams retracted after one hour treatment. when skimmer was on...
Conclusion,
Dosage at 5.5 gram is strong...I would not increase more than 5.5gram/500gal total volume...
Look like skimmer might have a positive effect on levi treatment, don't know why since after turn on skimmer, clam close their mantel and fish were more nervous, acans retracted....
Do not add any new fish when tank is in treatment or fish are in bad health...

joeyvu, what product were you using? I use 9 grams of Prohibit for 500gal and I haven't been subtracting for rock, sand etc. I've had no deaths thus far. Just curious what you're using? Thanks.
 
I used PROHIBIT...Dead fish was new addition. he is only one day old. I got it on sale....I should not have got it...I think your dose is about 5.5gram/300gal....
 
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