Red "dust/blood" on my zoa's

[tmplge]

Hi everyone. I have been talking with Mucho about how I can resolve my issues but I was wondering if anyone has encountered what I have before. My zoa's have been closing up, skirts missing and this has effected one colony after another. Most of the colonies are covered by a red dust (chalky). Some days this is worse than other days. All my params are fine. Occasionaly the dust looks like blood. I dipped them and brushed them off today to see what happens.

Has anyone had a similar experience? What did you do to deal with it? Any helpful ideas?

 

[furforfour]

Try more flow to keep this red stuff blown off the zoas.

 

[tmplge]

Thanks for the reply. I did increase the flow, but the red stuff does not get blown off even with direct heavy flow. The only way ive been able to get the stuff off is brushing it off or the hermit crabs will eat it sometimes.

I guess no one has ever had this experience?

 

[Pleco420]

Use a turkey baster to blow off any cyano that might cover some polyps. I get it occassionally in my tank...

 

[RevHtree]

Hmmm......Its not cyano.

I had this happen to a colony before. i actually used my fingers and wiped/rubbed/peeled the stuff off the colony. It was covering it. The stuff went away and the colony was fine. ????????

 

[tmplge]

Thanks for the input guys, i thought i was alone on this one.

Its not cyano I'm sure of that. All my params check out just right. Like Rev said, its does not blow off with anything, you have to physically take the stuff off. I have lost a colony to it already. It seems like this has slowly affected each colony one at a time and it is only zoanthids. GSP's and "yellow polyps" are not affected. I am setting up a QT tank but I am waiting for it to cycle. I do not want to give the zoa's to anyone else becuase I dont want to infect anybodies tank. I have tried waterchange every week but that seems to not affect them either. One strange thing I have noticed is that some colonies that are affected seem to bounce back and reopen but they dont look as healthy as they originally were. Well guys I will try some more things, run more tests, maybe it will help someone else one day.

RevHtree, did this red stuff affect any other colony or was it isolated to just one? Have you had any more instances?

Thank you everyone.

 

[RevHtree]

Hmmm...I think it did affect a few colonies. If I were you I would scrape it off the best I could then do a FW or Lugols dip and put them back in the tank.

 

[tmplge]

Thanks for the advice Rev. Ive been battling this for a few months now with mixed results. I have done the dip many times. At this point it looks like I am loosing the battle. I will keep you all updated. Thanks for the help everyone.