Reefer577
New member
Just wanted to comment on montipora nudis and the battle I've waged over the last year or two.
I think I originally got monti nudis from an infected colony from an lfs. I haven't been so fabulous about dipping in the past and didn't realize at the time what a tremendous pest these guys are. Anyone that tends to be a lazy dipper like me needs to heed the fact that monti nudis can really get around like no other pest out there. Even in a large tank if you just have a couple, they can spread to your other montis in no time, in days even.
They are hard for the untrained eye to spot and look like creamy detritus.
Another thing that makes them very tough to get rid of is they seem to be able to reproduce at practically any size. I've had montis with tiny nudis on them and I'll still find eggs. Drives me insane! :uzi:
Only during this past spring did I become really serious about getting rid of them. Dipping in Tropic Marin Procoral Cure helps to stun/kill the larger nudis so you can shake them off. Otherwise they can stick like glue to a coral if you try and blow them off. Usually I have a bucket of saltwater on hand so I can shake off the corals before putting them back into the tank.
But what to do about the eggs? It seems to take a week or two for them to hatch, but if you lose track the little bastards move from one coral to the next so quickly that some corals will get nudis and you won't even know it until later on.
The toothbrush became my best friend in the nudi battle. Whenever I would find nudis or eggs, I would just scrub them away. You can just skip dipping, because scrubbing will take care of it. Dipping is useful if you see nudis in crevices that you can't get to. Or if you're paranoid and suspect them of being in a crevice you can't get to.
I have found that monti nudis love caps and encrusting montis. They won't really bother branching montiporas unless you have a really bad infestation. They don't seem to like being out in the light and they love to hide in hard to reach places. I have even broken some parts of my corals in the past to get to them.
Another good way to keep them from spreading is to quarantine any corals that you find them on. Any colonies or frags that I found nudis on, I would put in a separate tank. Until those corals were fully treated and nudi free they would not go back in my main tank.
This is very important because even if you are checking all of your montis every other day and most seem clean, it doesn't matter because the nudis can truly move that quickly from one coral to another. Its almost like they have an intelligence. I have had nudis completely desert one coral and move over to a coral all the way across the tank, that never had a nudi problem before.
I've tried coris wrasse, six line wrasse, and christmas wrasse. None of these even looked at my nudis. My Allardi clowns were the only ones that loved the nudis when I would blow them off.
Finally I have reached the point where I can say I am nudi free. In order to get rid of nudis you need to be very diligent and do nearly daily inspections until you get the problem more under control. Out of all the various pests I have had over the years, none has been so quick to reproduce and spread as monti nudis. Because they stay hidden munching the underside of your coral its hard to tell that there is major problem, until you notice tissue damage when they start eating the top side of a coral.
I think I originally got monti nudis from an infected colony from an lfs. I haven't been so fabulous about dipping in the past and didn't realize at the time what a tremendous pest these guys are. Anyone that tends to be a lazy dipper like me needs to heed the fact that monti nudis can really get around like no other pest out there. Even in a large tank if you just have a couple, they can spread to your other montis in no time, in days even.
They are hard for the untrained eye to spot and look like creamy detritus.
Another thing that makes them very tough to get rid of is they seem to be able to reproduce at practically any size. I've had montis with tiny nudis on them and I'll still find eggs. Drives me insane! :uzi:
Only during this past spring did I become really serious about getting rid of them. Dipping in Tropic Marin Procoral Cure helps to stun/kill the larger nudis so you can shake them off. Otherwise they can stick like glue to a coral if you try and blow them off. Usually I have a bucket of saltwater on hand so I can shake off the corals before putting them back into the tank.
But what to do about the eggs? It seems to take a week or two for them to hatch, but if you lose track the little bastards move from one coral to the next so quickly that some corals will get nudis and you won't even know it until later on.
The toothbrush became my best friend in the nudi battle. Whenever I would find nudis or eggs, I would just scrub them away. You can just skip dipping, because scrubbing will take care of it. Dipping is useful if you see nudis in crevices that you can't get to. Or if you're paranoid and suspect them of being in a crevice you can't get to.
I have found that monti nudis love caps and encrusting montis. They won't really bother branching montiporas unless you have a really bad infestation. They don't seem to like being out in the light and they love to hide in hard to reach places. I have even broken some parts of my corals in the past to get to them.
Another good way to keep them from spreading is to quarantine any corals that you find them on. Any colonies or frags that I found nudis on, I would put in a separate tank. Until those corals were fully treated and nudi free they would not go back in my main tank.
This is very important because even if you are checking all of your montis every other day and most seem clean, it doesn't matter because the nudis can truly move that quickly from one coral to another. Its almost like they have an intelligence. I have had nudis completely desert one coral and move over to a coral all the way across the tank, that never had a nudi problem before.
I've tried coris wrasse, six line wrasse, and christmas wrasse. None of these even looked at my nudis. My Allardi clowns were the only ones that loved the nudis when I would blow them off.
Finally I have reached the point where I can say I am nudi free. In order to get rid of nudis you need to be very diligent and do nearly daily inspections until you get the problem more under control. Out of all the various pests I have had over the years, none has been so quick to reproduce and spread as monti nudis. Because they stay hidden munching the underside of your coral its hard to tell that there is major problem, until you notice tissue damage when they start eating the top side of a coral.
