How do I carpet bomb my tank full of aiptasia?

[The Hitman]

I have a 55 gal with about 40 pounds of Fiji live rock literally covered with aiptasia.

I plan to start over. I would like to kill all aiptasia and use the rock as base rock for the new setup.

Is there a way to effectively clean this rock?
There's at least 250 of them!


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999 posts from squat

[ February 08, 2002: Message edited by: The Hitman ]

[ February 08, 2002: Message edited by: The Hitman ]</p>

 

[clownhippo]

the peperment shrimp will kill the small ones. but im not so sure about the big one. it take alot more effort but you can squirt boiling water on them and taht kills them. i have done that

 

[Anonymous]

3 cups of bleach per gallon of aquarium water, turn your heater up to 90F+, and 5-6 days. Do a 100% water change with FW, run carbon for 72 hours, and repeat. Your rock will be extremely sterile.

 

[jamesw]

If the tank only contains live rock and water (and is healthy for fish) then I would recommend a Racoon Butterfly - borrowed from the LFS. He will eat literally ALL of the anenomes...large and small.

Once you are sure they are all gone, you can give away or take back the fish.

Much better than peppermint shrimp.

HTH
James

 

[liquid]

I agree w/ James. That's the route I'd take.

Shane

 

[rh]

James and Liquid are right on. My raccoon completely wiped out the aiptasia in my 75 (and it was getting ridiculous) and singlehandedly rescued my tank. I was about to try peppermint shrimp but had heard mixed reviews. Raccoons aren't exactly reef-safe, but if your intention is to start over w/ base rock and go from there - this is really the way to go. I'm so glad I have one - they're fantastic fish.
Good luck!

 

[Matt Lyon]

I don't have a lot of experience so take this with a grain of salt.

I had heard that it only takes one spore of the aiptasia to grow back. If this is the case then I don't think that it will solve the problem.

I had 2 starting grow on my spray bar but my copperband got to them. Point is I don't think that if the tank is infested with them that you can rid them in one fell swoop by using a fish. If it did work it would take weeks to make sure and the rock would have to be constantly rotated.

Just a thought. Please correct me if I am off.

 

[Anonymous]

I have a very similar situation. I recently started taking care of the tank at U of M Dearborn and they had been using kalk and a syringe to try and solve the problem. As you may guess the result is a couple hundred small devils hiding is ever little nook and crannie. Not even the three peppermints slow them down. I plan on getting some bergia egg strands and letting them go at it.

 

[HARRISON]

I would find a copperband that is eating at the LFS and add him to the tank. He will eat your Aiptasia and make a good long term pet if you can get him to eat frozen food when he is done with the Aiptasia. Then he will be there for long term control.

 

[MFisher]

After the Racoon goes through it will probably leave little clusters of cells (not spores-fungus and bacteria have spores, not coelenerates) that could grow into new baby aptaisia. These are what peppermints specialize in killing. A few (to a half dozen) shrimp thrown in will decimate the small ones.

 

[bkc]

Takes patience but highly effective, take a soldering pencil (hot), take the rock out of the water, cram the hot tip of the pencil into the nook or cranny that the aiptasia retracts into or is on and burn them out at the base.
because of quantity it will probably take a few attempts to eradicate them all.itsmells really nasty but it works!
Make shure you keep the tip of the pencil hot.

 

[EEreefer]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by MFisher:
<strong>After the Racoon goes through it will probably leave little clusters of cells (not spores-fungus and bacteria have spores, not coelenerates) that could grow into new baby aptaisia. These are what peppermints specialize in killing. A few (to a half dozen) shrimp thrown in will decimate the small ones.</strong><hr></blockquote>
This is the ticket. As the above posts indicated an RB is the very best in a tank with no corals to nibble. The peppermints will then control the small ones trying to recover. My RB cleared 200 lbs. of infested rock in less than a month. I removed him afterwards to save the corals and added peppermints which have apparently kept the Aips under control. I don't see any after 18 months. I now keep a small RB in my 150 sump/refugia to clean any new rock I add to the tank. HTH. JME.

 

[MFisher]

Yeah, my peppermints are long gone but I haven't had aptasia in years.

Now I introduced another weed-like anemone into my tank. I don't know the name of them but they look a lot like aptasia. "They" say peppermints won't eat them. I saw one specimen on some new caulerpa and by the next day it had moved 5 inches. Shot it full of Kalk, back next day. I then earranged some rocks and now its gone.

Crossing my fingers.

Matt

 

[The Hitman]

Thanks for all the replies!!

I'm going to order a Racoon Butterfly and a few Peppermints this week. I think I'll try Marine Depot Live, I've ordered equipment & lights from them but never livestock.

Again, I'd like to thank everyone for the advise!

 

[HARRISON]

I would go with the copperband. Then you can keep it and not have to worry about catching it later or about your corals. But thats just what worked for me...