ErinStecher
Community Member
- Joined
- May 9, 2018
- Messages
- 67
- Reaction score
- 46
Hi Guys,
I swear this is something new. Okay, maybe it's just aiptasia. I want you to see if there's something I'm missing though. I added a colony of Pink Hippos (zoas) to my tank about 2 months ago. Before adding, I dipped in Coral Rx (standard procedure). I had second thoughts about this frag, though, because instead of being on a frag plug, it was in a clam shell. The colony was so pretty and I was so happy to have them I didn't remove them, though I did blast them with Coral Rx water....
Over the last couple of months, I have been watching the polyps disintegrate one by one. It has been looking like zoa-eating nudis or even spiders. They lose a bit of flesh over a few days then disappear. I have about a hundred colonies of high-end zoas (in addition to some newbies coming from the WWC live sale), so I decided to pull these out and re-dip, this time in freshwater. Before doing so, I stuck them under my microscope and took some video.
My first thought was aiptasia, because these guys seem to have a foot and hold on to something. But then as I watched the way it moved, I thought it couldn't be. Plus, each of these guys is the size of one zoa skirt "frond", smaller than an aiptasia would be.
Then, after I FW dipped them, and grabbed some pics. Take a look - tell me if you guys have any ideas. I pulled 3 of this exact same organism off this frag. I pulled a few adjacent frags out of my tank and dipped - nothing came off at all - but I would really like some ID because if there are any more of these in my tank it will be just short of a disaster.
First is a video of one of them alive. It's 11 minutes long - just watch the first 2 minutes so you can see how it moves. 2nd is a video of the dead creatures after a FW dip. Below that are a couple of still shots. I would love any ideas! Thanks guys!
I swear this is something new. Okay, maybe it's just aiptasia. I want you to see if there's something I'm missing though. I added a colony of Pink Hippos (zoas) to my tank about 2 months ago. Before adding, I dipped in Coral Rx (standard procedure). I had second thoughts about this frag, though, because instead of being on a frag plug, it was in a clam shell. The colony was so pretty and I was so happy to have them I didn't remove them, though I did blast them with Coral Rx water....
Over the last couple of months, I have been watching the polyps disintegrate one by one. It has been looking like zoa-eating nudis or even spiders. They lose a bit of flesh over a few days then disappear. I have about a hundred colonies of high-end zoas (in addition to some newbies coming from the WWC live sale), so I decided to pull these out and re-dip, this time in freshwater. Before doing so, I stuck them under my microscope and took some video.
My first thought was aiptasia, because these guys seem to have a foot and hold on to something. But then as I watched the way it moved, I thought it couldn't be. Plus, each of these guys is the size of one zoa skirt "frond", smaller than an aiptasia would be.
Then, after I FW dipped them, and grabbed some pics. Take a look - tell me if you guys have any ideas. I pulled 3 of this exact same organism off this frag. I pulled a few adjacent frags out of my tank and dipped - nothing came off at all - but I would really like some ID because if there are any more of these in my tank it will be just short of a disaster.
First is a video of one of them alive. It's 11 minutes long - just watch the first 2 minutes so you can see how it moves. 2nd is a video of the dead creatures after a FW dip. Below that are a couple of still shots. I would love any ideas! Thanks guys!
Last edited:
