Zoa's dying?

[nicky11]

Hey guys, my zoa's don't seem to be very happy lately. When I first got them it took them about a week to all fully open up. I have had them for about 3 months now and a couple weeks ago notice a bunch of them starting to close up and not opening again. Even a bit of algae has started to grow on the closed ones, which I think is causing them not to want to open up again.

But then I actually sat down to look at them and noticed little worms appearing. I decided to try and catch a few using a pipette and from what I have researched online is that they are some kind of Syllid from the genus Myrianida. Though some say they do not bother the zoa's, others say they are definitely harrasing them.

Has anyone here had this same problem? Any ideas on how I can maybe get the closed zoa's to open up again?

I've attatched some pics of my zoa's before, my zoa's now and the little critter.

 

[nicky11]

Oh, here are some of my tank parameters:
Temperature: 28-29 degrees Celcius
Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: less than 5 ppm
Alk: 12 dKH
pH: ~8.2-8.4
calcium: 450 ppm
SG: 1.026
phosphate: ~0.5 ppm
magnesium and strontium: do not have tests, but do regular top offs with fresh water and kalk +2


Other corals: pink star coral, red mushrooms, hammer coral, frogspawn coral. (all seem fine)

Inverts: Cleaner shrimp, Boxing shrimp, a few hermits, a medium sized feather duster, tons of stomatella and vermitid snails, pineapple sponges

Fish: Sailfin tang, bicolor dottyback, lawnmower blenny, 2 clowns, blue ribbon eel (this guy has been in for the last 2 months and is doing amazing)

Lighting: two 36 inch wave point 4 T5 fixtures and a blue led strip

Tank volume: 200 gallons total

If anything else is needed let me know

 

[nicky11]

caught another one

 

[nicky11]

Ok, so I have an update. I decided to put my zoas through the hydrogen peroxide dip and voila what appeared.....a fireworm, but now my issue is that it has decided to hide in the rock. Is there any method on how to flush this guy out.

 

[A. Grandis]

Those type of worms (Myrianida) normally live in association with corals, sponges, zoas, etc. Many worms do!
Myranida could possibly feed on them!
Beautiful worm!!!

I've had some of those before and never noticed any affected polyps by those type of worms, but there are many different species, so...

Worms, including fireworms, are actually good for the system, if they don't prey on our polyps! I personally don' keep fireworms because I don't want to take the chance and get hurt when I need to put my hands in the tank.

Try to find the firework at night, if you want to remove it from the system. Just gab with the tweezers.

Grandis.

 

[solracju]

its a possibility that algae might be chocking out your zoa's i see in the second pic on the first post that the algae is growing around them and maybe forcing them closed. it happened to me in a algae bloom almost killing my utter chaos

 

[A. Grandis]

its a possibility that algae might be chocking out your zoa's i see in the second pic on the first post that the algae is growing around them and maybe forcing them closed. it happened to me in a algae bloom almost killing my utter chaos

:thumbsup:

Apparently he has solved the algae issue with the peroxide.

Grandis.

 

[nicky11]

Yeah, the algae problem seems to be clearing up, the peroxide dip did good. Although is it possible that the peroxide could have killed the fireworm?? Because last night I spent hours checking for the fireworm to come out and never did. Maybe it was stressed out and it'll come around now. But I definitely want to get this critter out. If it is the actual problem thats killing my zoa's, I really don't want to risk anymore cause here in Peru, corals are mighty expensive.

 

[A. Grandis]

The worm probably died, if was there with the peroxide, I guess.
I'm glad you've solved your problem!

Grandis.