Acros in trouble

[LoneStarReef]

So I’ve been losing my higher end acros for some reason. All my other corals (montipora, digitada, birds nest, etc) are doing fine. I pulled one of my dead corals out and found what looks like eggs on the coral skeleton. See pic below. Any idea what this might be?

 

[bubbgee]

Acropora Eating Flatworm. It's going to be a struggle at this point.

What I've done to manage it:

• KCL Dip and scrub those eggs off the acropora frags
• Dose KZ flatworm stop daily
• six line wrasse, springer damsel and CBB in the tank
• Nightly basting.
• Do the above for 6-8 months. You need to manage the subsequent lifecycle of new baby flatworms and prevent new eggs from spawning.

The flatworm can be invisible. it takes the color of the acropora which is why you dont see them until it's too late (camouflage abilities)

 

[LoneStarReef]

Oh man! That sucks. Makes sense. I’m probably going to remove all the acros anyway (they’re mostly dead). Looks like I can starve the flatworms if they don’t have anything to eat. Nice excuse to start over and buy all new acros! Sounds like I need to wait a minimum of 6 weeks but I’ll probably wait 3 months or so.

 

[bubbgee]

Oh man! That sucks. Makes sense. I’m probably going to remove all the acros anyway (they’re mostly dead). Looks like I can starve the flatworms if they don’t have anything to eat. Nice excuse to start over and buy all new acros! Sounds like I need to wait a minimum of 6 weeks but I’ll probably wait 3 months or so.

The fallow time I read was around 4-6 months to be sure. In my case, I am just managing the outbreaks.