Aiptasia or something else?

[Lorraine Vavra]

Hello,
Just found in my 20, where I segregated my Pistol Shrimo gone bad, a tube like anemone growing on some proliferata. 1" long stalk, not tube, and 1&1/2-2" tentacles. Took food schrimp easlily and swallowed it to the bttom of tube. Sorry, no camera, Good or bad, should I ry to move it to another tank with 2 Peppermnt shrimps? Thanks for the input.
Lorraine

 

[Anonymous]

Lorraine,

It sounds like it, particularly if you could see the food being swallowed, as aiptasia are semi-transparent!

Does it look like this?

Or this?

If so, it's aiptasia.

If it looks more like this, it's a majano, also best to remove, even though it's prettier than the aiptasia.

 

[Lorraine Vavra]

Thanks Burntom,
Yes, it does somewhat look like the second picture. Longer tentacles but the same color. Well, I hope it is happy living with the killer Pistol Schrimp. I have read some about them and it seems like one just has to be careful that they do not get out of hand. It is living in the Pistol Schrimp's time out tank so that if the Schrimp decides it is afraid of it, I am sure the Schrimp will eat it! Thanks
Lor

 

[Anonymous]

Lor,

The shrimp won't touch it I'm afraid (only true peppermint shrimp are known to). Best thing to do is kill it. There are various ways of doing this:

Biological:

Eaten by peppermint shrimp, Copperband butterfly fish (though not guaranteed as it depends on the individual) and a certain type of nudibranch (which will die once it exhausts your supply, so not recommended). I wouldn't recommend buying livestock to get rid of a small infestation anyway.

Mechanical

Take rock out of tanks, prompting aiptasia to withdraw. Cover aiptasia bump with superglue or milliput (tightly, covering all of it well).

Inject either a thick kalk solution or Joe's Juice into aiptasia. This will kill it.

Remove rock and burn off aiptasia.

There are no doubt other solutions, which you should be able to find on this forum. Leaving the rock may just mean more aiptasia later (they spread easily) and having to deal with it at a later stage.