Acropora infection ID?

[Ashwinclement]

I have a couple of pieces of acropora that seems to have some sort of bubbling disease.
This is some green mariculture piece

This is a bonsai acro that i got from a fellow reefer

As you can see they tissue seems bloated or bubbled, but its hard to touch. I did some research initially and found some threads on tissue bubbling disease (a bacterial infection) which looked similar to this, they just suggested, maintaining proper flow and stable conditions and they would recover, but its been months and it never improved, the growth also have seemed to have stopped/slowed way down, but it did not bleach.

I suspected flatworms right from the start, so i took turkey baster to these acros at different times of day and night several times over the months, hoping i could see any flatworm flying off, didnt find any, i dont see bite marks thats typical to AEFW, so i am not sure what this is. I am guessing some sort of bacterial infection at this point

This is how they looked when i bought them

I started noticing this issue in the bonsai acro first and then after sometime the green acro started showing symptoms.

I decided to try KZ flatworm stop since there might be a chance flatworms are present but not evidently visible. Also for their claim that KZ flatworm stop supposedly strengthens coral tissues and helps regeneration. Right after i started dosing it, the bonsai acro started to STN and the green one seems to have regained color at certain patches in the colony. At this point, i dont care if i lose these acros, the flatworm stop is doing something. I havent tried dipping them, since they are all well encrusted to the rock and i didnt want to break them off. i am just worried if this disease/issue will pass on to other acros, i have three more that are doing well, no sign of this bubbling, other sps, montipora, stylophora, pocillopora and seriatopora are unaffected

 

[Graffiti Spot]

Make sure your calcium and alk are being dosed in equal proportions but other than that the only other thing I have seen cause this is people using a carbon source when it’s not needed or using too much to quickly. Also seen it in random tanks with no apparent cause. It can spread in my experience. But normally isn’t a real huge issue and most people find it eventually goes away if they keep things healthy or move the affected corals to a different tank.
It does look like aefw is hurting the bonsai acropora. The flat worm stop will take a few months to start helping but does work if you keep using it. I would baste all your acropora as often as you can to keep the worms off of the corals and hopefully get fish interested in eating them. Most fish will eat them once they learn what’s going on. Try feeding a little food each time you baste the corals to get the fish active and searching for food.
I would guess that if you don’t keep the worms off the corals by basting them they will probably continue to do badly unless you have been dosing the fws for a few months already. If you can dip all the acros it would be the quickest method. Don’t be scared to break them off the rocks to dip them.

 

[Ashwinclement]

I use all for reef and I test calcium once in a while, calcium always stayed around 440-450. I keep alk near 8.5-9. Yeah I will try to dip the acros and keep up with the flatworm stop dosing.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

I would let your calcium drop lower to 420 or even 400. Then keep going with the balanced dosing additive. Sometimes just this change will help with these hyperplasia issues.
if you turn your pumps off you should be able to see any flatworms fly off when basting. And it’s possible to suck them up with the baster to remove them when the pumps are off too.

 

[Ashwinclement]

Just wanted to post an update. I tried blowing the colonies now and then with pumps turned off, couldnt spot any flatworms. I tried cutting some frags as the coral was dying. Tried dipping those frags on hopes to catching a flatworm, didnt find anything. The frags did not survive as well. The bonsai acro is completely gone by now the green now is 70 % dead. As the acros died and exposed the skeleton, I can see that the skeletion itself has these "bubbled" shapes, its a issue with the tissue. The patchy look on the bonsai acro which looked like flatworm bite marks, are actually because of blue sympodium sending out tendril like runners and growing on it and irritating/killing the tissue at those spots. I was not able to spot that since bonsai acro and the sympodium are more or less the small color. I am continuing to dose flatworm stop, havent spotted this symptom in other acros, they are doing good.

 

[sculpin01]

These are Acropora growth anomalies, thought to be likely bacterial or viral in origin.

Growth Anomalies on the Coral Genera Acropora and Porites Are Strongly Associated with Host Density and Human Population Size across the Indo-Pacific

Growth anomalies (GAs) are common, tumor-like diseases that can cause significant morbidity and decreased fecundity in the major Indo-Pacific reef-building coral genera, Acropora and Porites. GAs are unusually tractable for testing hypotheses about drivers of coral disease because of their...

journals.plos.org

 

[Ashwinclement]

@Graffiti Spot you were right i do have AEFW in my tank. I accidently broke an acro while trimming a stylo near it. On its back side found aefw bite marks, when i dipped it, one flatworm dropped out and i also found egg clusters on the bottom of that acro. I chopped off the egg cluster. Removed the small colony from the rock and dipped and removed two flatworms total. This acro was next to the bonsai acro. The other acros are growing fine at the moment so i am thinking of just basting it now and then to keep the population under control.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

Good eye! They always seem to hide on the side of the corals that you can not see, it’s like they know you can see them almost. Keep basting the acros because even if you don’t see them come loose, it does help keep the corals flesh healthy. When they get worms the flesh can become very weak and just detritus floating and getting stuck on the coral can start die off.

 

[ScottB]

I believe that AEFW are smart enough to hide during the light cycle to avoid predation from fish. Once the fish go to sleep, the worms go do their thing.

You may find (as I did) that the worms have very strong preferences for some acros versus others. Mine loved Milli.

The only sure fire way to get rid of AEFW is to remove all the acros from the rock, mount them on a rack and dip the rack every week for two months. Putty over any encrustments. I used food grade potassium chloride. It does not stun them like most dips. It destroys them. But the egg removal most be done manually.

While I like FWS, it did not reduce my worm population noticeably.

 

[Ashwinclement]

I believe that AEFW are smart enough to hide during the light cycle to avoid predation from fish. Once the fish go to sleep, the worms go do their thing.

You may find (as I did) that the worms have very strong preferences for some acros versus others. Mine loved Milli.

The only sure fire way to get rid of AEFW is to remove all the acros from the rock, mount them on a rack and dip the rack every week for two months. Putty over any encrustments. I used food grade potassium chloride. It does not stun them like most dips. It destroys them. But the egg removal most be done manually.

While I like FWS, it did not reduce my worm population noticeably.

Thats a good point, I will try doing the turkey basting at night then. I will think about if i can accommodate eradication protocols. I have been dosing FWS for more than 2 months before noticing the AEFW, so I guess its not doing much. Thanks for the suggestions!

 

[Graffiti Spot]

When was the last time you introduced a new fragment?

 

[Ashwinclement]

When was the last time you introduced a new fragment?

June last year was the last acro addition to my tank.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

I would expect you would have seen much more dramatic signs of aefw damage if you had not started the fws. It really does help corals recover quickly and i would keep using it if I were you. I rid my tank of them using a double dose and routine basting of the corals. Reefers who had a fairly heavy infestation of aefw when they started using the product were the ones that I saw having trouble seeing results. Once the worms lay large egg patches in tanks with lots of acros or multiple large dense colonies it can become frustrating to control with any method.