POLL: Do you have aiptasia in your reef tank?

[Lbrdsoxfan]

Lol. Anyone that votes no either hasn't been in the hobby long enough or hasn't looked close enough. The right tank inhabitants will hide the problem until you look in overflows, plumbing, or sumps.

I was a FOWLR guy for years, nah never had ANY aptasia. This time around, it took 4+ years, and 3 tanks later finally saw one over the weekend. I smothered it with kalkwasser paste and glued over it. Lol. I almost removed the rock and promptly burned it with fire, but I like the zoa garden that's finally growing off the plug.

 

[mattdg]

I can guarantee that the majority of reef aquariums have aiptasia, whether you realize it or not. I have not seen it in months in my system, but by no means do I assume it is not there. Unless you are clinically careful, only introduce coral that has been fragged, removed from plug rock... you have it. If you have introduced any type of LPS coral, you likely have it, unless you were able to remove all of the parts of the coral that do not have live tissue growing on it. You likely still have them. If you have peppermint shrimp, file fish, aiptasia eating nudibranches and everything else that feeds on it, you probably still have them. Aiptasia can lay dormant in overflow, sump, rock crevices, for many years unnoticed. Once those critters are gone, back it comes.

The point here is not to be a downer. I think some of us focus way too much on preventing these and other pests from entering our systems, to the detriment of our enjoyment of the hobby. You can start your tank as a sterile system, with dry rock, sps frags cut high off the base and quarantined for months and still get it in your system. The bio diversity is half the enjoyment of keeping a reef tank. Placing our main focus on total pest prevention, can really ruin your enjoyment of the hobby, especially if you put all the work in... and still get one!!

Instead of worrying so much, maybe embrace these inevitable pests, trade coral freely with your reef friends, use it as an excuse to add a cool aiptasia predator or two, to your system.

Good thread below on the topic of fish that mitigate all kinds of reef related issues.

Let the tank do it's thing, enjoy more, trust your critters and stop trying to micro manage everything.

Transformative fish that eliminate problems

There are countless posts about the same issues, aiptasia, bryopsis, sandbeds, etc. While hobbyists continue to bang their heads against their tanks, often over thinking how to solve the problem, there are often simple biological fixes. If you have a problem keeping your sand bed clean a...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Shooter6]

Are there different types of aprasia? I have small brown ones in the sand and larger purple ones on my rocks?

Sounds like you may have majano too. Those are far worse then aptasia

 

[Fin Jackson]

This is a picture of me filling up my 30ml syringe out of the industrial size aptasia X bottle. So yes I have an aptasia problem, and still no solution.

I had a major infestation and a Klein butterfly ate them all within a week. Nipped poccis but left everything else alone.

 

[Greybeard]

With ORA and BIOTA breeding mottled filefish, the problem, IHMO, has become far easier to deal with.

I had a problem, added a mottled filefish, no more problem.

 

[Jesterrace]

Lol. Anyone that votes no either hasn't been in the hobby long enough or hasn't looked close enough. The right tank inhabitants will hide the problem until you look in overflows, plumbing, or sumps.

Had one single one that hitchiked on a frag 5 years ago, but it was very small and I killed it as soon as I saw it (I also got rid of the frag for good measure). Been over my tank, overflow and sump many times keeping an eye out for the evil little prong shaped heads and haven't seen a single one since. I agree it's pretty much a given if you use regular live rock or buy Colonies, but if you use the likes of Dry Rock, Caribsea Life Rock and buy your corals as small frags where it's much easier to detect them early on then it is possible to keep it from speading in your tank.

 

[dr_vinnie_boombatz]

Unless you are clinically careful, only introduce coral that has been fragged, removed from plug rock... you have it. If you have introduced any type of LPS coral, you likely have it, unless you were able to remove all of the parts of the coral that do not have live tissue growing on it.

This is what I do. Granted I have a smaller AIO and more setup like a LPS frag grow out tank with disks, BB, racks, and seachem matrix in media basket (no rock in DT). I think it is possible to avoid pests and that has been one of my initial goals when starting in the hobby 1.5 years ago (do not bristleworms too).

I limit the vendors I buy from, buy from strong reputation vendors such as SBB & Cherry Coral, remove frag plugs, dip, and monitor.

When I go to the local fish stores and see Aiptasia on the snails I don't even risk it.

I think a QT tank would help alot too. When I upgrade next year I will use the smaller AIO to quarantine.

Maybe I'm being naive

 

[Bob Weigant]

Just when I thought I got rid of them I found 3 monster ones in my overflow. They will be dealt with today

 

[PlumbTuckered]

Do you have aiptasia? If so, how do you manage it? If you don’t have aiptasia, how did you prevent them?

The presence of Aptasia in a tank is dumb luck. Or, un-luck.

It is a hitchhiker on live rock. Often you don't even notice it until is pops up in your tank.

I picked up a few frags from a LFS and found Aptasia in the a 4 year old tank several days later. Obviously, it was on one of the frags.

I like how it looks. I keep a close eye on it and trim out most but leave some.

 

[TortillaMan]

Do you have aiptasia? If so, how do you manage it? If you don’t have aiptasia, how did you prevent them?

I’m going to try berghias and a file fish. It’s not that bad that I would need to do that but once the outbreak is over I’m keeping the file fish cuz they are cool

 

[Wasabiroot]

With ORA and BIOTA breeding mottled filefish, the problem, IHMO, has become far easier to deal with.

I had a problem, added a mottled filefish, no more problem.

I wish I could go that route, but mine got a taste for cynarina and demolished it pretty quickly so now I have two peppermint shrimp and they seem to eat all the tiny ones.