Pests on Acros?

[LuizW13]

Kind of a noob here, so i'm not sure what these are- never seen these before. Anyone wanna do me a solid and help me out?

 

[Tahoe61]

The white tuffs are mesenterial filaments, used as a defensive and nutritional mechanism. You can also see them when a coral is stressed. Looks like coral has burnt tips?

 

[LuizW13]

The white tuffs are mesenterial filaments, used as a defensive and nutritional mechanism. You can also see them when a coral is stressed. Looks like coral has burnt tips?

Oh, thank you for that. Now that you mentioned that i think i remember seeing that when i dipped a mushroom some time ago.

I don't think the tips are burnt, they don't look discolored in any way.


Oh by the way, those are two different acros. The first two images are one, and the rest are another.

 

[LuizW13]

For anyone interested, i believe the top two images are tubeworms. I saw two little whiskers coming out from that earlier today. Just odd that is growing within the coral.

Could that be a bad thing?

 

[nautical_nathaniel]

In regards to the two little whiskers coming out: Like this?:

If that's the case, they are spionid worms.

 

[LuizW13]

In regards to the two little whiskers coming out: Like this?:

If that's the case, they are spionid worms.

yup yup yup yup yup just like that!

Do they bother corals? I've noticed that a lot of the acro frags have this little guys in the base of the frag. But that one frag in the picture above has them on the tips.

 

[nautical_nathaniel]

yup yup yup yup yup just like that!

Do they bother corals? I've noticed that a lot of the acro frags have this little guys in the base of the frag. But that one frag in the picture above has them on the tips.

They can bother some corals (Acros, other SPS) a little as they extend their two antennae out for food and make contact with the coral, but for the most part I think they are harmless. I would look into getting some sort of wrasse (Sixline, Melanurus, Yellow Corris, etc.) to keep them at bay though, no telling what would happen if they went to multiplying too quickly.

 

[LuizW13]

They can bother some corals (Acros, other SPS) a little as they extend their two antennae out for food and make contact with the coral, but for the most part I think they are harmless. I would look into getting some sort of wrasse (Sixline, Melanurus, Yellow Corris, etc.) to keep them at bay though, no telling what would happen if they went to multiplying too quickly.

oh man, having a wrasse is bit tricky for me.

I have a 25 gal nano, one chalk bass, one rainfords goby coming tomorrow and i really want a pair of clowns eventually. Adding a wrasse might make things over crowded?

 

[nautical_nathaniel]

oh man, having a wrasse is bit tricky for me.

I have a 25 gal nano, one chalk bass, one rainfords goby coming tomorrow and i really want a pair of clowns eventually. Adding a wrasse might make things over crowded?

I have a pink-streaked wrasse in my 20 gallon who does an okay job picking around for stuff on the rocks, but I don't think is nowhere near as good at it as my sixline was. I guess the only other thing you could do to get rid of them is to dip the affected corals, try Coral Rx or something similar.

 

[LuizW13]

I have a pink-streaked wrasse in my 20 gallon who does an okay job picking around for stuff on the rocks, but I don't think is nowhere near as good at it as my sixline was. I guess the only other thing you could do to get rid of them is to dip the affected corals, try Coral Rx or something similar.

you have both of those wrasses in a 20?

I dip every frag- those little buggers are hard to kill!

 

[nautical_nathaniel]

you have both of those wrasses in a 20?

I dip every frag- those little buggers are hard to kill!

Nope, only the pink streak wrasse. The sixline wrasse went to live in my girlfriend's mom's tank haha

 

[LuizW13]

Nope, only the pink streak wrasse. The sixline wrasse went to live in my girlfriend's mom's tank haha

Haha that's cool!

 

[LuizW13]

So, it looks like those tube worms are negatively affecting the coral- it's starting to lose tissue from the tip down in the site of those tube worms.

 

[stylaster]

you can superglue the tube worms to their death by adding a drop on top of their tube or cut the effected branch off

 

[LuizW13]

you can superglue the tube worms to their death by adding a drop on top of their tube or cut the effected branch off

That's what i'm going to do- it's just a bit difficult because the receding tissue is very close to the main trunk. My birdsnests corals are going through STN and it seems that fragging off the infected areas just accelerate the tissue loss- so I've been hesitant.