Pineapple Sponge outbreak

[saabmike]

Hey guys,

I'm having a bit of an issue with an out break of pine apple sponges. They are all over the place where the lights aren't directly hitting them. I know the general consensus is there fine and they'll probably go away on there own but I was wondering if I can do anything to kick there population down/ get rid of them? My parameters are 7.5 nitrate, .07 phosphate, 1500 mag, and I use tropic pro for salt at 1.025~1.026. So I don't think its a nutrient problem. I have a skimmer going for 12 hour at night. Oh and I make my own rodi water and i just changed out the Di resin about 2 months ago and only put less than 200 gallons of water through it. any advice would be great!! They are EVERYWHERE and when i scrape them off with a toothbrush they go all over the place in the water column. and I use 2 nature dimensions filter rollers. Thank you again in advance!! Ill try to take some picture later.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

From what I have read, either

A. Scrap them off, and they will go away
B. Leave them alone, as they don't harm anything.

I'm curious to see photos to see how bad they are

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

They eat dom and pom, so if you have a plague of them then you must have a lot of dom and pom in the water, IMO better filtration and more water changes will help.

I have a few in my seahorse tank that that are withered and slowly dying back because the water is too clean.

They can only multiply according to the food source in the water, so its a water issue IMO.

 

[saabmike]

Yes there is a ton!! ill take a picture when I get back to the house! Mr. Mojo im sorry Im still a neewbie whats Dom and Pom? lol My nitrates and phosphates are good and steady and im not sure now much better filtration i can get with 2 filter rollers, and a skimmer. I have waterbox 65.4 AIO, i forgot to mention that.

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Yes there is a ton!! ill take a picture when I get back to the house! Mr. Mojo im sorry Im still a neewbie whats Dom and Pom? lol My nitrates and phosphates are good and steady and im not sure now much better filtration i can get with 2 filter rollers, and a skimmer. I have waterbox 65.4 AIO, i forgot to mention that.

particulate organic matter (pom) and dissolved organic matter (dom). Are you overfeeding perhaps? It seems like you have good filtration, but somehow there is enough food for them to multiply . Is your tank new? New tanks can have weird infestations until they stabilize.

 

[saabmike]

AH makes sense thank you for the explanation. My tank is about 10 months old. I think I am a little heavy on the feeding but i would've thought my nitrate and phos would be reading high if that was the case.

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Don't fall in that trap, there are dozens of parameters that we can't test for, even icp can't test for organic levels, bad bacteria levels, etc...

 

[martin.a]

Well, given the lemon... Pineapple cocktail recipes.
Seriously, they are harmless and actually beneficial biofilters. Syconoid sponges common in aquaria are small and short living. Just be careful and don't kill them all at the same time as this may release quite a bio-load.