Zoa's and Amphipods

I find it interesting that some posters say the pods will ignore certain colonies in favor of other ones. The real question might be what's the difference between the colonies that get eaten & those that don't. Could it be wild-caught versus aquacultured zoas? Sessile inverts like sponges & cnidarians use a variety of defense mechanisms to defend themselves from being eaten. Zoas have both physical (stinging cells) and chemical (toxic substances) means of protection. The ones taken from reefs where they're exposed to constant predation may have better defenses than tank-bred colonies. What do you all think?
 
that would make sense........but of the few wild colonies i hae in a sea of aquacultured........the wild ones have just as many of these predator pods munching on them........more so in relevance as they really seem to like my PE polyps of any flavor....but tend to stay away from the rest. On the wild colonies it doesnt seem to matter whether a zoa or a paly. Never have seen them pick on protos though......
 
GGGGGRRRRR!!!!! after everything opened up this morning I took a good look at my frags and colonys. There is a good size section of skirt missing on my PPRPE. I am suspecting it was the evil pods that did it. I'm getting a pod assasin today.
 
I havent ever noticed them ever picking at skirts

anyone else?? They seem to just pick away at the stalks.......very slowly as in you cant even notice overnight damage, but they just keep picking....and picking.......

Is that consistent with what others have seen??
 
They pick at the mouth, digging in the mouth, skirts, stalks name it they did. Most of my zoa are aquacultured from other reefers. I've had brand new colonies get anhaliated days after being put in. ( seen them at night, hundreds eating them up ).
 
I have seen a couple polyps disappearing on perfectly healthy colonies in my tank the last week or so. I figured it was a bacteria infection so i removed a couple frags to QT and did a series of dips. Those frags/colonies are now fine. But then last night i spotted the same thing on another completely healthy 3 year old colony. It basically looks like the skirt is completely eaten away, in fact i KNOW thats what it is. Using a magnifying glass i can see 1 or 2 tenticles still connect, and the coloring still on the flat disc part of the polyp. I have only 2 clowns currently. Looks like i'll be adding a wrasse soon.
 
I have noticed large amount of very large amphipods in my tanks as well, but after doing some homework and searching through Bob fenners FAQ's on WWM, i found that these crustaceans are supposedly harmless to corals and very beneficial to the system as a hole. But i am very skeptical of these statements because about a month ago i bought a small colony of yellow polyps. One night i was checkin out the tank with a flash light, and the yellow polyps covered with swarming amphipods. over the next couple of days the polyps would not open, and, eventually, the polyps disappeared all together. I don't want to jump to conclusions, but it does seem that these creatures devoured the polyps. But all i'm saying is, be aware that we all could be over exaggerating and this loss of polyp could something completely different.

also, i have a sixline and coral beauty, both of which each amphipods, and my tank is still swarming with them.
 
Just cause Fenner said it dosn't happen dosn't mean it dosn't. I myself and a lot of folks here have first hand accounts and see for our own eyes.

I've stayed in front of my tank with a red light of over an hour on various days watching these bastards take out colonie(S). remember centuries ago everyone thought and believed the world was flat.
 
I was on the side of the fence in which i did not believe that they ate zoas... i now know that they do.
I bought two small colonies about 3 weeks ago and they were fine for a few days. One colony, within 2 days turned to mush and was constantly being smothered by pods. the 2nd colony was doing great besides a bit of zoapox. after about a week of looking great and staying strong i decided to dip in furan per instructions on that one site. They looked good they opened back up and the next day after work they were covered in pods and by the next morning they were mostly gone.

All my other colonies in the tank are untouched and doing just fine. My original thought was that when the zoas aren't 100% is when the pods just take over.
 
I wouldn't have believed it either. Until i saw them eating away on a 3 year old colony. Then the other night i watched as a 3/4" long pod scurried away from that colony, landed on the glass and sat there munching on a green tentacle right in front of me.

I picked up a wrasse yesterday, hopefully he helps out.
 
mandarins mouths arent big enough to catch these monsters nor are they fast enough to really accomplish much when you need them to
 
i'm sorta reluctant to add a coris, especially with my leopard and fairy wrasses in there. I think what's really bothering my zoanthids and palys are spaghetti worms.
 
I have a yellow, a leopard and a carpenters flasher in the same tank fwiw absolutely zero issues.......
 
yeah but you have a 225 dispersing aggression. in my 55, a coris will probably get cranky. plus with my luck, i'll get an evil one.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12189559#post12189559 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by delsol650
Just cause Fenner said it dosn't happen dosn't mean it dosn't. I myself and a lot of folks here have first hand accounts and see for our own eyes.

I've stayed in front of my tank with a red light of over an hour on various days watching these bastards take out colonie(S). remember centuries ago everyone thought and believed the world was flat.
Click to expand...


thats why i said i was skeptical. =)
 
LOL,

Kigs, just get a really small one. I have it swimming happily in a 100 with a large blue sided and leopard, before it was housed with 2 large lineatus, soralientsis?, capenters etc. Never bothered anyone. would spend all day inspecting colonies and rocks for ampipods and tiny crustaceans.
 
i have a 24g mantis tank with tons of amphipods. i have some zoas and hoping to get more, as of now i haven't seen any of them eating the zoas, they're opening except for when they get walked over. however, i'd like to avoid any future issues. since i can't get any fish, is there any other way of eradicating this problem? or should i just hope for the best, since it is a mantis tank and they are messy eaters there should be a good amount to scavenge off of.
 
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