Vermetid Snail ELIMINATION - In tank Treatments

[giz1007]

You can tell that you need do dose more when algae starts growing on your glass again.

My experiences are with commercial and personal tanks. In all cases, these are ULN systems and the filtration is able to keep up with the die off. with that in mind, you don't want to hit your tank hard with a strong dose up front. Rather, you want to slowly introduce this medication. It will absolutely work provided you don't do this too quickly. Your first sign that the CP is working is that you stop having to clean the glass so often. All algae dies off, snails and worms die off too. If you have a mature tank with lots of worms, then they are going to increase your risk of an ammonia spike.

Now if you detect ammonia with a test kit, then dose amquel. Both products are compatible.

So the truly difficult part is taking this slow while knowing it will work as long as the die off doesn't all happen overnight. Since I don't know your tank, I would advise to go ultra slow with 10% of the typical dose added to your tank once per week over a period of up to 10 weeks. The first three weeks you will know if your filtration system can handle the snail the die off. Just keep dosing 10% per week eventually it will kick in. You probably won't even need to get up to go the full 10 weeks. When all the snails are dead, just leave the med in the tank for another month and enjoy the algae free and snail free look of you new tank. Then introduce carbon and water changes.

To minimize risk, I would not turn off your skimmer at any point and I would also plan to change out your filter socks every couple of days.

Note that the commercial (LFS) tanks and personal tank are all relatively new tanks where CP was planned for from the beginning. The LFS tanks are given small maintenance doses every two weeks or so when the glass starts to show an algae haze. If your tank is mature with lots of worms then you could have die off just like if you dosed prazipro in your DT. Both are safe with caution but you have to go slowly. Both will kill all the worms in your tank and ammonia may become an issue so tastyfish's story is something to be concerned about. Manually remove all the regular snails and worms you can find with a fish net going through the sand.

Per the Ick-shield powder instructions it suggests that reef lights should be off during dosing, if it's dosed over such a long period is it ok to keep lights on as normal?

Just waiting on amquel delivery next week, then the nuking will begin, moving my corals this weekend to QT tank along with shrimp will post picks on progress as this is the only way I see this vermin being eliminated.

 

[saphosbro]

Okay i only skimmed the thread but has the use of lasers been talked about? I have a 445nm 5mw cheap ebay laser i have successfully used to kill many many vermetid's.

It obviously does not wipe out the entire population but keeps in check and also keeps them from spreading when you cook them with the laser.

For a while i had several dozen and after using the laser have not seen any in months but i do expect to need to zap more in the future.

 

[giz1007]

Update:
My tank is free of them as I can see. Once my tank started showing no ammonia again I ran carbon and started a couple of larger water changes. This was at about 9 -10 days after initial treatment. I put a sacrificial monti frag in after about 3 days of running carbon. 3 days after that i noticed no I'll affects so I started adding the rest of my frags. All frags have been returned to the DT and all are doing great. I've continued to run carbon throughout just to be safe.

Once water changes started and carbon was added algae came back fast. Lots of nutrients available now. Just seems to be a green film type. Thankfully no hair algae yet. I've yet to add any snails back as I've given all a scrub with a wire brush and have them in quarantine to make sure there is no more vermetid growth. My two maxima clams have been scrubbed and await their return to the DT as well.

So far so good. Hopefully things continue on the right track.

Hey RC, Did you get rid of the vermetid's and what did you take enough precaution to prevent they're reentry to the cleaned DT?

 

[rc1626]

Hey RC, Did you get rid of the vermetid's and what did you take enough precaution to prevent they're reentry to the cleaned DT?

Unfortunately it did not eliminate the vermetid snails. They are still present to this day but are much less in number. Not sure if this is due to tank maturity or if something else has played a role in their decline.

 

[giz1007]

Unfortunately it did not eliminate the vermetid snails. They are still present to this day but are much less in number. Not sure if this is due to tank maturity or if something else has played a role in their decline.

Thanks

 

[giz1007]

You can tell that you need do dose more when algae starts growing on your glass again.

My experiences are with commercial and personal tanks. In all cases, these are ULN systems and the filtration is able to keep up with the die off. with that in mind, you don't want to hit your tank hard with a strong dose up front. Rather, you want to slowly introduce this medication. It will absolutely work provided you don't do this too quickly. Your first sign that the CP is working is that you stop having to clean the glass so often. All algae dies off, snails and worms die off too. If you have a mature tank with lots of worms, then they are going to increase your risk of an ammonia spike.

Now if you detect ammonia with a test kit, then dose amquel. Both products are compatible.

So the truly difficult part is taking this slow while knowing it will work as long as the die off doesn't all happen overnight. Since I don't know your tank, I would advise to go ultra slow with 10% of the typical dose added to your tank once per week over a period of up to 10 weeks. The first three weeks you will know if your filtration system can handle the snail the die off. Just keep dosing 10% per week eventually it will kick in. You probably won't even need to get up to go the full 10 weeks. When all the snails are dead, just leave the med in the tank for another month and enjoy the algae free and snail free look of you new tank. Then introduce carbon and water changes.

To minimize risk, I would not turn off your skimmer at any point and I would also plan to change out your filter socks every couple of days.

Note that the commercial (LFS) tanks and personal tank are all relatively new tanks where CP was planned for from the beginning. The LFS tanks are given small maintenance doses every two weeks or so when the glass starts to show an algae haze. If your tank is mature with lots of worms then you could have die off just like if you dosed prazipro in your DT. Both are safe with caution but you have to go slowly. Both will kill all the worms in your tank and ammonia may become an issue so tastyfish's story is something to be concerned about. Manually remove all the regular snails and worms you can find with a fish net going through the sand.

Do u keep reef lights off for total period, (ie) looks like 3 1/2 months?
how do the fish cope in black out situation for so long?
I've read about CP not being good for certain types of fish - Hippo's and Anthias / 6 line rasses etc.. of course all the types I have in my display!!!

great thread, planning to do a dose of ICk shield powder but worried it won't work?

 

[ThRoewer]

Bacteria will degrade CP (and many other medications) rather quickly as this study on Praziquantel (the active ingredient of PraziPro) shows: Praziquantel degradation in marine aquarium water
Similar observations have been made with CP, so its use in an established tank is rather questionable.

 

[tkeracer619]

I've been thinking about this for a while.

This is a good read.

https://academic.oup.com/mollus/article/76/2/133/1067836

Then I started looking at various molluscicides. One jumps out at me, Ferric sodium EDTA. It's a type of chelated iron, and while highly toxic to arthropods, that may be a price we have to pay to win the war.

I am wondering if it's function in a saltwater environment is such that the concentrations needed to kill the vermatids is low enough that fish and coral would be unharmed. It reacts with the copper based compound in the blood of molluscs.

Another approach I was considering... In the study above, it shows that the brooding females lay egg sacks that swell and intake water. I'm wondering if a combination of manual removal and low doses of iron can halt reproduction of vermatids all together and then manual removal over time can rid them.

 

[Isayso]

If I had opportunity to use chemical I would have done, but because I don't have access to it I pulled the plug, and bleached the hell of everything

 

[five.five-six]

I have been dosing zeovit coral snow for about 3 weeks now and am seeing a dramatic impact, time will tell.

 

[Isayso]

I have been dosing zeovit coral snow for about 3 weeks now and am seeing a dramatic impact, time will tell.

The impact is in a positive way or in a negative way?

 

[five.five-six]

The impact is in a positive way or in a negative way?

I think that's a mater of perspective. In a really bad way if you are a vermetid snail.

 

[Isayso]

For me it went out of control ,I did try everything but the chemical,
Check these pictures
https://flic.kr/s/aHsmJaQC76

 

[pisanoal]

For me it went out of control ,I did try everything but the chemical,
Check these pictures
https://flic.kr/s/aHsmJaQC76

Your vermetid problem is the worst I've seen...

I don't even really notice mine anymore so I don't worry about them. Occasionally, a coral will encrust over it so ill notice the irregular growth.

 

[pisanoal]

I've been thinking about this for a while.

This is a good read.

https://academic.oup.com/mollus/article/76/2/133/1067836

Then I started looking at various molluscicides. One jumps out at me, Ferric sodium EDTA. It's a type of chelated iron, and while highly toxic to arthropods, that may be a price we have to pay to win the war.

I am wondering if it's function in a saltwater environment is such that the concentrations needed to kill the vermatids is low enough that fish and coral would be unharmed. It reacts with the copper based compound in the blood of molluscs.

Another approach I was considering... In the study above, it shows that the brooding females lay egg sacks that swell and intake water. I'm wondering if a combination of manual removal and low doses of iron can halt reproduction of vermatids all together and then manual removal over time can rid them.

This is intriguing...

 

[Isayso]

Your vermetid problem is the worst I've seen...

I don't even really notice mine anymore so I don't worry about them. Occasionally, a coral will encrust over it so ill notice the irregular growth.

Not to crush your eggs int the basket..... But at the beginning my tank was like you said, and then there was a boom...out of control

 

[Oldreeferman]

I wish a Reef safe cure could be found here, ive searched all over the WWW nada... im getting concerned, the vermetids i introduced from frags or live rock are slowly over taking my rocks both old & new & now on my corals undersides, and its accelerating......I can see the white baby snails at night crawling about but can't think of anything that might want to eat them? The patience required to keep these out has to be legendary in a QT, i can't imagine how one would restart a new tank & not eventually get them again if adding coral frags or any live rocks unless you QT for 2 yrs. im not that patient & its not a Public Aquarium, i didn't even see any until way over a yr. into my setup and i don't remember ever seeing anything on any frags or plugs after dipping them, i looked closely with a magnifying glass. These snails suck............Oddly they were never mentioned much on line nearly as much as other pests are. Mostly presented as watch them carefully or its a natural part of a well cycled tank, sigh.

 

[pisanoal]

Not to crush your eggs int the basket..... But at the beginning my tank was like you said, and then there was a boom...out of control

Ive had them in my tank for probably 5 years or so. Ive restarted once in there and was unsuccessful in not carrying them over to my new tank, but its beven setup for over a year now and the population has stabilized. There are different species, some seem to be much more invasive. I probably have a couple hundred, but they dont grow that tall, and they dont seem to like to be densely populated. I also broadcast feed my tank with frozen food, so its definitely not that there isn't food for them to explode.

 

[Isayso]

I wish a Reef safe cure could be found here, ive searched all over the WWW nada... im getting concerned, the vermetids i introduced from frags or live rock are slowly over taking my rocks both old & new & now on my corals undersides, and its accelerating......I can see the white baby snails at night crawling about but can't think of anything that might want to eat them? The patience required to keep these out has to be legendary in a QT, i can't imagine how one would restart a new tank & not eventually get them again if adding coral frags or any live rocks unless you QT for 2 yrs. im not that patient & its not a Public Aquarium, i didn't even see any until way over a yr. into my setup and i don't remember ever seeing anything on any frags or plugs after dipping them, i looked closely with a magnifying glass. These snails suck............Oddly they were never mentioned much on line nearly as much as other pests are. Mostly presented as watch them carefully or its a natural part of a well cycled tank, sigh.

The white babies that you see are the colonists snails they are about 1/4 " or smaller and they are good snails , the vermetid don't crawls,

 

[drukkosz]

I have been dosing zeovit coral snow for about 3 weeks now and am seeing a dramatic impact, time will tell.

+1 to this. I have been using if for close to a year now and see drastic reduction. still have few here and there but defiantly less that I started with.


I started to use it everyday, It will cloud your water and make sure your skimmer is running so it can pull all the junk out of your water.

I do it once a week now because my water is so clean and I have zero algae in my display.