One thing irritating me, amphipods.

[Graffiti Spot]

So I have always had lots of life in my tanks but for the past few years I have had a seemingly uncontrollable amount of pods and amphipods in my tank. So much so that they actually bother my acropora. If I pick up a piece out of the water bugs are swarming off onto my hand. If I pick up a tile a coral is on and flip it, the whole bottom is swarming with copepods. I never have good extension on polyps and think this is one reason why. I have even found them nesting in healthy branch crevices on top of tissue which eventually will make the coral start to die off and I have to cut it up.
I have always kept wrasse and am wondering what else I can do besides barely feed at all. I stopped feeding frozen last year when I moved into a 100 gallon Rubbermaid to downsize and only feed pellets twice a day since. And before anyone says dose interceptor, that’s not going to help. I did 9 months ago and no change at all, it doesn’t kill pods like everyone thinks, I have used it many times and never seen much of a pod reduction. Honestly I think they actually get a larger population a few months after a treatment.
I was thinking about getting a school of some chromis that might eat them. Or just take everything out of the tank and rinse all rocks and corals off in a container like I did when I moved everything over last year.
The copepods aren’t trouble but the large amphipods I know for sure are not helping me out. Seems I never hear complaints about this but have struggled with a overly huge population for maybe 3 or 4 years. I have a yellow wrasse and a big pink fat wrasse that looks like a pod killer. The only other ones I think might help is a mystery and a melanurus.

Anyone else find large amphipods this annoying?

 

[Jonathan Troutt]

I am interested in hearing peoples responses to this.

Do mandarin gobies not eat them? I keep a target spot and while i see some in my tank i dont ever see a whole bunch. And the target spot is super fat.

 

[29bonsaireef]

Spanish or Cuban Hogfish. I had a crazy population of amphipods before I put a Spanish hog in my system, now I only see them in the fuge.

 

[Hemmdog]

I had an abundance of amphipods until I added my 2nd leopard wrasse. Now I rarely see them. My mandarin isn’t thrilled.

 

[xxkenny90xx]

Im sure a dragonet would solve the copapod problem, not sure it would touch the big amphipods though

 

[SeaDweller]

I know my amphipods are growing cuz I see the moltings floating around. The fish spit them out, and I only hope my sole leopard wrasse eats them. I’ve seen the pods scurrying around my frags and stuff, but I don’t see them irritating my acros. I hope this never becomes a problem like you’re having.

Do you not want another wrasse?

 

[BadFish619]

Was gonna say let a mandarin or scooter loose, guaranteed to put a dent in it

 

[Butuz]

Same here, when the lights are out, there are a TON of them all over sand. During say time, I know they are cruising under zoas, but they dont seem to disturb them, they seem to use a zoa canopy as protection to roam undetected. I rarely see them in the open when the lights are on, just when food is nearby, you see them dart from the crevices to grab it and they disappear again.

 

[Ike]

Get some Halichoeres sp. wrasses or three (get some that are 3"+ for amphipods). Melanarus is one of the better ones and inexpensive. Leopard's work as well, but are more sensitive fish and tougher to get acclimated. Dragonette's could help, but often won't help much with larger pods. Mystery, 6 lines (and the like), hogfigh are all good as well but can become real jerks.

Don't bother with chromis or damsels, they're usually pretty useless for this stuff. Besides, chromis don't actually school, and shoals typically become one dominant fish as times passes.

Lastly, amphipods lefr unchecked are usually far more problematic with zoanthids, but they will become irritants for SPS and it's best to keep populations in check.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

Mandarins eat copepods and maybe small amphipods, these amphipods are as big as a small mandarins head so I doubt they would do much. I used to see them all over when I had a breeding pair of mandarins.
I don’t really want to add a bunch of wrasses because too many and the fish start scaring other wrasses out of the tank.
A hogfish is a good start I think, thanks for that suggestion, I knew there was a fish I was overlooking. I still just don’t see it denting the population much or too fast but it might be my best bet.
I was really curious to see if anyone has had populations this big to where they get into corals. The only other thing i was thinking could be the cause is I keep all my corals on a black acrylic frag rack across the whole tank. It sits on top of my live rock so barely any light gets through to the rock, except the very sides. Maybe the pods are drawn to the upper half of my rack where the corals are because that’s where all the algae and stuff is, on the light side. Maybe I should try only keeping frags on a smaller rack on one side and mount all my colonies on rocks.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

Get some Halichoeres sp. wrasses or three (get some that are 3"+ for amphipods). Melanarus is one of the better ones and inexpensive. Leopard's work as well, but are more sensitive fish and tougher to get acclimated. Dragonette's could help, but often won't help much with larger pods. Mystery, 6 lines (and the like), hogfigh are all good as well but can become real jerks.

Don't bother with chromis or damsels, they're usually pretty useless for this stuff. Besides, chromis don't actually school, and shoals typically become one dominant fish as times passes.

Lastly, they're far more problematic with zoanthids, but they will often become irritants for SPS and it's best to keep populations in check.

Yea I used to keep a malanarus in all my tanks and didn’t have this issue then, they are my favorite pod eater. I figured this fat big bodied pink wrasse (same body style but forget the name) would do the same job but I don’t even see it much in this setup. The chromis I was thinking about were Vanderbelts or one bars or something along that body style, but your right about most not being able to keep numbers up.

 

[Jinko]

Dragonette will help, possibly a file fish they love to cruise around munching on stuff.

 

[Garia666]

Fridmani Or royal gramma are active hunters of small critters. Blue spotted goby swallows the bigger stuff in a whole.

 

[Tamberav]

I guess I have different ideas because I would add nocturnal fish to catch them suckers at night.

Nocturnal and cave dwelling gobies with big mouths and big appetites to get them when pods are most active.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

Jinko, dragonettes wont help with large or even medium sized pods, they feed off copepods mostly. And I have a filefish too.

Garcia 666 I have a orchid dottyback somewhere hiding in the rocks. That’s about the same thing I would say. And a blue spotted goby wouldn’t really do well in a Rubbermaid with no sand, full of rock halfway up with a acrylic rack over top of all the rock would it? I wouldn’t think it would ever be up top eating pods, they normall are bottom dwellers right?

Tamberav, like I said above I am not sure gobys would be a good idea. But I have never really housed them in my tanks though so if someone thinks I am wrong say so.

Thanks for all the reply’s and help. I have been fighting these things back for a long time, hince why I have a lot of the fish people are suggesting but I might have to take pics sometime to show how bad it really is. I am still not sure fish are going to help unless I starve them of no food for a while. And that sounds like a bad idea to me.

 

[Jinko]

Do you have big issues with ditritus as I've only noticed a spike in amphipods when there is a lot of ditritus for them to eat.

 

[Squidward]

I've never liked those boogers and eventually realized they weren't the pods that Mandarins eat. Some ppl in this hobby including some vendors in the past sold them as though they were the right pods for mandarins. My new tank is just starting and I hope I don't get ampipods. I only want the small copepods.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

Thanks for the bump I forgot about this thread.
It is time for me to give the tank a cleaning so I am sure there is lots of detritus. Even in the tanks I had up before where I cleaned detritus out every week they would flourish. I got a big six line because I got so fed up. I don’t even look at the tank anymore, I had some salinity swings when I was away and lost some stuff so I am just letting things go now. Bryopsis is growing like a weed so I will probably do a good tank cleaning and rinse all my rocks and whatnot. That’s normally what get things turned around for me.

 

[merkmerk73]

I'm starting to not like Amphipods - they're sneaky, hide really well, and nothing I have seems to really eat them effectively.

I suspect they may be irritating certain corals in my tank, as well. But I'm not sure.