Pete's 280 log

[ReefEnabler]

ill take some of those rictasia from you!

 

[psteeleb]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12112313#post12112313 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by RyanBrucks
ill take some of those rictasia from you!

Hehe, so are you going to drive out here and pick them up? If so, you better hurry, I've got about 2/3rds of the colony wiped out.

I'm finding that injecting them with vinegar will basically kill off the main body, then folowing up with some kalc paste will take care of the residual pieces. Just have to watch out for those floaters.

 

[psteeleb]

here is the rock I'm clearing of rics. there are only a couple left in the lower right section near that pencil urchin. Two days ago it was covered so much you could not see any rock surface between the sps in each corner of this picture

 

[psteeleb]

here's some shots from today

end tank - you can see how narrow 2' is

some orange rics, taken as a reflection in the front glass from top down

I'd swear this Oregon Blue tort frag looks like it grew some, but I only picked it up last week from makoj. Maybe it's still on his tank steroids or something

 

[psteeleb]

here are a few more frags that I'm growing out

this blue tip prostrata looks mostly purple to me, maybe as it grows the baby blue will come back

after a week the pink jade is still looking good

my chips acro is starting to get it's color back after being moved around and having it’s lighting changed

I'm liking the intensity of the green on this stylo

and this pink purple stylo seems to be settling in just fine

this cranberry blue tip milli lost some of it's color but seems to be adjusting fine. the color is actually starting to come back

this GH aqua delight seems to be doing just fine also

and this pink milli is starting to turn pink... after about a month

the ultimate pink stag needs to start getting it's color in. I just mounted it today and it seems to be happy

 

[psteeleb]

I posted this on spskeepers but havn't got any responses. I looking for opinions on dipping sps for potential AEFW's.. I can't get all of the acros corals out for dipping but was planing on hitting the rest with some lugals. Just looking to see if people think this is a good idea, or, if it may cause more stress then it's worth, or why bother at all? I'll be using tank water so I would think stress on the sps would be minimal. thanks

even though I havn't seen any AEFW's in my tank for three weeks I am considering pulling most of my colonies and frags out and doing a Coral revive dip on them. I will not be able to do all of the acros as a couple are too large or encrusted on large pieces of live rock.

I'm looking for thoughts on if it's worth it or best to leave them alone.

As long as they are out, should I treat with anything else? This is not a QT set up, and I don't intend to do all sps at once, but any ideas are welcome.

If you think it's worth it; I'm also looking on thoughts the process I intend to use listed below

1) turn off all pumps
2) drain 5 gallons of tank water into a bucket and add the appropriate amount of coral revive
3) dip all frags in coral revive solution
4) pull and dip most colonies in coral revive solution doing the slimers last
5) durring the process of dipping mix up a batch of lugals in dip concentration and slowly baste the colonies that can not be removed alowing them to bathe in the lugals until the pumps are turned back on
6) replace water with fresh salt mix
7) turn on pumps

 

[melev]

I would only focus on corals that need the attention, rather than treating them all. For example, montis and millis wouldn't need to be bothered. Anything that looks faded or has retracted polyps, or that had bite marks, those would be the corals I'd focus on.

 

[melev]

I would only focus on corals that need the attention, rather than treating them all. For example, montis and millis wouldn't need to be bothered. Anything that looks faded or has retracted polyps, or that had bite marks, those would be the corals I'd focus on.

 

[psteeleb]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12167376#post12167376 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by melev
I would only focus on corals that need the attention, rather than treating them all. For example, montis and millis wouldn't need to be bothered. Anything that looks faded or has retracted polyps, or that had bite marks, those would be the corals I'd focus on.

thanks Marc

Do you think it puts undue stress on corals if I was to dip corals that do not show any signs as a precaution anyway?

I only saw AEFW signs on 3 corals, 2 of them I do not plan on dipping becuse they are encrusted on rocks and the third one has an acro crab that will have to be removed prior to dipping.

I do have other corals that have other signs or issues, but I'm not sure if they are a result of my husbandry, AEFW's or something else. For example my green slimers have some random dead spots. At first I thought they were isolated to one coral that fell into a xenia and got stung but I'm noticing some spots on another coral. I have taken a close look and even blasted the coral with no signs of AEFW, so I don't have a clue what it is. I have also had a couple colonies loose some flesh on the undersides, but this could be from any number of reasons; changing lights, less frequent water changes, me having my hands in the tank more often, a drop in alk, (husbandy issues) etc. But just in case I plan on dipping these..

I have also noticed that the tri color that had the worst AEFW infestation (it's the one I pulled the 30+ from) has made a very good recovery. The skin has recovered from the bite marks. There is some tissue loss underneath, and what oddest is there is a huge batch of brittle stars now living in it. I suspect they are eating the food scraps and detrious that get hung up in the coral base. I have not seen any signs of AEFW in this coral for three weeks. Two weeks ago I soaked in (in place) with lugals. I am now leary of repeating this due to the brittle stars. I'm kind of hoping their presence will be a deterent to AEFW's

I found a yellow coris wrasse at a LFS that I hope to pick up and add this week

Any other thoughts or ideas are appreciated, thanks

 

[melev]

Tri-color Acros are their favorite food, as are many smooth skinned deepwater acros. I don't think they would be a problem a slimer.

Like Sanjay said, just keep blasting them a few times a week and let your fish gobble them up.

 

[psteeleb]

here is a new addition to seek out and destroy AEFW and other sps pests:uzi:

 

[melev]

That's a beautiful fish. I love Yellow Coris Wrasses.

 

[psteeleb]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12207365#post12207365 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by melev
That's a beautiful fish. I love Yellow Coris Wrasses.

thanks Marc

Here is a actinics only picture I took today of the Cyphastrea Decadia frag I got 2 months ago. It's still hanging in there and seems to be growing despite falling and getting stung a couple times

 

[cbui2]

great addition, how big is the wrasse?

 

[psteeleb]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12208779#post12208779 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by cbui2
great addition, how big is the wrasse?

Thanks - he's about 3 to 3 1/2" long. When I released him after acclamation, he swam down to that area and several of the other fish checked him out. Fortunately no one was interested in him, other then my bi-color pseudochromis, and lasted only about 5 seconds. He checked out some rocks for about 2 hours but never ventured more then about a foot away from the area in the picture then decided to bury himself under the rock in the top right of the picture. He came back out about 2 hours later, but still didn’t venture very far and when the main lights went out he buried himself again for the night. So far so good, and he’s close to one of the AEFW affected corals, so I’m hoping he scopes it out and cleans it of any predators that I missed. His primary purpose is coral pest predation but it is a nice looking fish. I’m still in the market for a Christmas wrasse to add to the pest cleaning crew.

Thanks for asking

 

[psteeleb]

The main tri-color colony that got hit by AEFW's seems to be recovering. I try to blast it every day with a turkey baster and have soaked it in place a couple times with lougals. Now this other coral that is close to the bottom of my tank has not been looking as good. I have also been trying to blast and soak it but it's very difficult to reach and I have to work on it blindly.

I notice what looked like eggs on it so I decided to break down and remove it. It is an encrusted coral that popped up on a piece of live rock and I still have no idea what it is but am leaning toward a tri color of some sort. To get to it I also had to move around a few other rocks but doing so works into a re-scaping plan I'm working on to allow for more sps space in the tank.

I set up three buckets of tank water; one with Lougals, another wth TLF Coral revive and the third a saltwater rinse.

here is the coral rock out for inspection and sure enough EGGS

here it is in it's first bath of Lougals, I blasted it and shook it around a bit

and found a AEFW - I'm loving seeing this pest all shriveled up

Unfortunately there are other casualties

Here are the eggs again prior to be taking a knife to them. I looked closely all around the coral and any suspected eggs got scrapped off. I probably over did and did some extra damage to the coral, but I figured it was better safe then sorry.

here it is back in the tank after about an 30-45 minutes of stress. I put it a little higher in the tank where I can reach it easier, and will probalby repeat the process again later this week

 

[melev]

I hate those things. I've sacrificed corals that had them just to keep my reef healthy. Getting every last egg seems almost impossible to achieve.

 

[psteeleb]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12213411#post12213411 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by melev
I hate those things. I've sacrificed corals that had them just to keep my reef healthy. Getting every last egg seems almost impossible to achieve.

Gosh Marc, such words of encouragement. This stinkin coral has been with since day one when it was nothing more then a small smear on a rock. It's kind of like the tank mascot.

 

[melev]

Hey, by all means save its life. :thumbsup:

I did the best I could with my precious Tyree frag, but after all that I ended up losing it in an entirely different scenario (salinity was super low due to my refractometer being way out of calibration). Fortunately I'd banked a piece with a few people and got a piece back a year later.

When I saw them last in my tank, there were 2000 eggs in the core, so I cut out that section and tossed it, but kept the tips and the base that was AEFW free. Still I think they have have made a reappearance in my system about a month ago because my tricolor has faded significantly. The coral is encrusted, and I've not tried to pry it off the boulder.

 

[psteeleb]

I hope you know I was just kidding. If I need to sacrifice that rock, so be it. Its the big boulder with the other tri-color I'm more worried about. For the most part it looks like it has cleared up everywhere but one spot, and I blasted it pretty good the past couple days. I haven't seen any AEFW or eggs on it yet only a bunch of small brittle stars that are deep in the root of the thing now. They weren’t there until after I gave it it's first lougals soaking and I' m wondering if they are feeding on AEFW carcass.

Actually thaks for the insight. So how did you clear the boulder the first time, did you break, scrape and treat or did you pitch it?