animalkingdom
New member
So I have noticed the steady decline of my green slimer over the last few months. It slowly lost its fluorescent green coloration as it browned out then went pale. Now it has started to STN from where it encrusts onto the rocks in multiple places. I was thinking I had AEFW and pulled a chunk out too look for eggs, worms, or bite marks. Upon initial inspection I couldn't come across the telltale bite marks or eggs so i proceeded with a dip to see what came off. With heavy basting in the dip I wasn't able to detect and AEFW come off so I strained the dip water through a coffee filter to be sure. Still nothing but the normal coepod/amphipod and maybe a baby bristle star or two. I put the coral downstairs in my frag tank (same system) when I noticed my one green slimer frag down there had the same symptoms as the colony upstairs. I chucked the frag into the yard to be safe.
Today I brought a piece of the worst looking area of the colony into the lab with me to see what I could see under the stereoscope. Keep in mind this piece was dipped the previous day and sat in a tank overnight, then, was desiccated in a plastic bag on my drive to work for about an hour. With no camera on the scope I tried to hold my phone up and got some poor images and saw something interesting.
Little unidentified black lines at STN front:
Large worm slowly weaving in and out of dead skeleton pores hiding from light source (black squiggle):
Another shot of the worm profile:
Above pictures all 40x or less
I also saw something that resembled AEFW eggs, but were about 1/20th the size and really only discernible at 100x magnification which I dont have a picture of because that was on the regular microscope and it was hard to get into good focus.
Other things to note:
All other acropora in tank are fine besides maybe one ORA Hawkins frag that has not done anything in the tank for 4 months and has very slow STN at base.
Other acropora in tank (all fine):
ORA Red Planet
ORA Ant Insig
ORA Stuber Stag
ORA frogskin
JF bonsai
Tyree Tierra del Fuego
Wishin2boutside rasberry cheesecake
Alabama blue tort
California tort
Acropora valida
ORA Purple and green
Acropora nana
ORA plum crazy
Maricultured unk species
Acropora nasuta
Do I have AEFW or something else??
Today I brought a piece of the worst looking area of the colony into the lab with me to see what I could see under the stereoscope. Keep in mind this piece was dipped the previous day and sat in a tank overnight, then, was desiccated in a plastic bag on my drive to work for about an hour. With no camera on the scope I tried to hold my phone up and got some poor images and saw something interesting.
Little unidentified black lines at STN front:
Large worm slowly weaving in and out of dead skeleton pores hiding from light source (black squiggle):
Another shot of the worm profile:
Above pictures all 40x or less
I also saw something that resembled AEFW eggs, but were about 1/20th the size and really only discernible at 100x magnification which I dont have a picture of because that was on the regular microscope and it was hard to get into good focus.
Other things to note:
All other acropora in tank are fine besides maybe one ORA Hawkins frag that has not done anything in the tank for 4 months and has very slow STN at base.
Other acropora in tank (all fine):
ORA Red Planet
ORA Ant Insig
ORA Stuber Stag
ORA frogskin
JF bonsai
Tyree Tierra del Fuego
Wishin2boutside rasberry cheesecake
Alabama blue tort
California tort
Acropora valida
ORA Purple and green
Acropora nana
ORA plum crazy
Maricultured unk species
Acropora nasuta
Do I have AEFW or something else??
