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- Oct 24, 2016
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OK folks, I have yet to post here. I have been following since the beginning, but have kept silent. I am not one to endorse or bash a product...especially in the preliminary phases. I was one of the ones who got the first batch that clearly didn't work. Jeff has been great about listening to feedback and replacing bottles. To be honest, it was difficult for me to stick with this. I have a 300 gallon system(sps dominate) and doing weekly dosing, water changes, maintenance, etc. was not only tedious, it was expensive.
To be fair, I have been doing a reasonable amount of dipping during this whole process. I am four months in and have done three separate treatment regimens. The last of which were triple doses and finished last week.
Results - Treatments 1 and 2 did not work. There were clearly issues with the consistency and strength of the batches received. The third batch was thicker, smelled more potent and took longer to dissipate in the tank itself. The third batch appears to have worked! I dipped every coral and frag in my tank yesterday. Not a single worm. This will be the second week of a clear tank. In addition, no sign of stress, bite marks, eggs, etc. Color and PE are clearly returning. Too early to declare complete victory as I would like to go a full month with no interference.
Feedback - First and foremost you must treat this 4 week dosing regimen as something you need to participate in. It is not a "set it and forget it" type of treatment. You need to be proactive with basting, moving acro's, scraping infected rock, etc. The goal is to make these buggers as uncomfortable as possible. Squirt them off the acro's...move their homes to a different spot (where possible). Don't baby the process and be aggressive.
You must shake and re shake the bottles. To be honest, I believe this is the most difficult piece to the puzzle and probably where most of the breakdowns take place. I used a full 16 ounce bottle for each single dose. Just the way the math worked out. I can tell you that I would not have gotten similar consistency per dose if I had to use 1/4 bottle or 1/2 bottle each dose. In some cases. even after vigorous shaking, the bottom of the bottle had clumpy residuals still present. I would empty the whole bottle, then refill with tank water, shake and empty again. For those with smaller tanks, I just am not sure how you get consistent dosing parameters for each dose. One suggestions for UWC might be to sell multiple size bottles so one can use a full bottle for each dose even for smaller tanks. Even still, I believe there were some inconsistencies in the third batch of bottles I received. Some appeared thicker than others and some appeared to have more residuals on the bottom than others. Not sure if this had something to do with the shakedown process on my part...but I can tell you I vigorously shook each bottle. I have a sneaky suspicion that those having problems with the latest batch are having a problem with consistency?
You must test your water parameters during the entire treatment. Spikes happen...and it may not happen in the first dose. Could be the second or third, but you will almost certainly have to vary your dosing schedule during the month long treatment.
Lastly, those claiming Purge killed off their acro's or anything else are simply wrong. I have a complete mixed reef system. Did I lose a couple acro's, yes. Were they directly related to Purge...absolutely not. Anybody claiming otherwise probably did not take appropriate precautions. (ie checking parameters) Again, I have gone through three complete dosing regimens. The last of which were with the newest batch of bottles and I was TRIPLE dosing. My tank took longer than 24 hours to clear up. My entire house reeked of Purge even the day after treating. I actually felt bad for the fish in my tank! Yet, the treatments did not kill anything. Things like scoly's and plates actually opened up and ate during treatment.
Overall I believe this is a clear breakthrough in the fight against AEFW. This bug has claimed victory for decades and I now believe we have something to break the chain. I read some negative feedback from others about products like flatworm exit, etc. that would never be released if they were not 100% effective which literally made me laugh out loud. Some people need to get off their high horse and live in a glass half full world. This product was just created. There are bound to be hiccups. Those claiming others never had issues like this have no idea what it was like in the very beginning. There is always a trial and error process. I am guessing UWC doesn't have the manpower or finances for double and triple blind studies, etc. Likewise, I am sure there were getting hundreds of emails stating please release whatever you have as AEFW is killing my system. I know I was chomping at the bit to get my hands on something. Do I wish now that I waited...well yes, of course. I wasted dozens of hours and a crap load of money. However, I am a happy camper right now as I may finally have my display tank back and looking beautiful!(although I do reserve the right to get take all this back if I have AEFW in a few weeks!!)
Get the newest batch.
Make sure you shake each bottle way more than you think you need to.
Baste, scrape, move acro's. Don't let anything stay unsettled.
Test, test and re test your water parameters.
Don't be afraid to overdose. IMO more is better than less and it won't kill your inhabitants.
One more thing. For those who dip with just Bayer. Beware Beware Beware. Bayer does NOT kill all AEFW. I have tested this because I was so annoyed my tank got infected in the first place. Melafix does. Expell does. However, I will be double dipping going forward as I believe Bayer does kill things that perhaps the others do not. Just my opinion.
Thanks so much for the detailed review! Really sorry about the bothched bottles, but it is what it is and glad we figured it out as soon as we did so we could move forward, get people replacement bottles and watch as tank after tank come out AEFW free, which I think people are seeing now as a few more people are posting publicly