Rookie mistake. Have you done the same?

[Syntax1235]

First time my father and I dipped 3 new frags with it. only 1 survived and it looked horribly wrong.
We didn't think much of it at first, thought it must be due to a stress from the move itself, things do happen, even if rarely.

Second time, we received a new frag from a friend, dipped it - 2 days later it looked very pale, even though we haven't put it in a high PAR area at all.

Then about a month later we had an alk swing, one Acro reacted and just started to show signs of stress. We took it apart into around 15 to 20 frags, we planned to do this anyway so it wasn't a big deal. We usually use Iodine to dip when fragging, especially if something is wrong, but we were out of Iodine so picked the next best thing we had instead. Only 2 survived and they looked as bad as they could. (they both fully recovered eventually).
Now, you'd think it's because the coral was in bad shape, right, but it wasn't fatal either. After all, we had this Acro for over a decade and it wasn't the first swing we went through with it, not even the second or third, it's a pretty darn hardy Acro and a well behaved one in situations like this.

Third time - We talked with a friend, a fellow reefer and he asked us if we've heard about this new dip and started telling us that nearly all the acros he tried to dip with it were dead after a awhile. Same signs - they were all paling away.

Fourth time - We spoke with our LFS's owner, a close friend of ours for nearly 20 years.
We asked him if he had TLF revive in stock, because we tossed what's left of this dip and realized we would never take another chance with it, and sure enough he suggested to try this new Red Sea dip. While we were telling him our story another reefer approached us and said he went through the very same thing himself, acros just paling away.
The owner did say he'll reach out to Red Sea about the matter, but I doubt he ever did.

Obviously others milage may very, and it could've been just a bad batch (it was the very first one), but with the evidence I've seen and heard, and from my very own experience I could never recommend this dip to anyone else, and if I can I would go as far as to warn others.

Thanks for sharing your experience. Lots of information. Time for me to go back to Bayer.

 

[Syntax1235]

@DanyL @Charlie’s Frags

What dip have you both had the most success using?

 

[DanyL]

For the longest time we used Revive by TLF, and sometimes Coral Rx by Blue Life, and we still do for anything but acros.

For the past 2 years we switched to a homemade dip based of concentrated Praziquantel for acros, mainly as a preventative against AEFW (not for stress or antibacterial purposes), and it does work well and so far we did not notice any ill affects. It is based on a research from recent years and showed us results in practice.
If you want to read the thesis yourself you can find it here.

After treatment we also take a Turkey buster or a small pump and blow off anything that might stick to the tissue, since Praziquantel essentially paralyzes muscles, anything that was left on the tissue falls off very easily.
After this we also carefully inspect the coral with a magnifying glass for eggs.

If at any point we have suspicion for pests, we take a plastic tub, old light and pump and setup a temporary quarantine system with biweekly treatments of Praziquantel for around 2 to 4 weeks, and watch it closely.

 

[DanyL]

One important thing to note - The reason why we looked for other, better treatment methods in the first place was due to the fact that importing Bayer over here is practically impossible, however we eagerly looked for a way to get our hands on it.

So unfortunately I cannot compare the method we use to the effectiveness of Bayer.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

@DanyL @Charlie’s Frags

What dip have you both had the most success using?

Bayer worked the best on preventing bugs but some acros didn’t like it either. I now use potassium chloride to check for aefw and do regular in tank interceptor treatments for parasitic copepods.

 

[DanyL]

parasitic copepods

First time I hear of parasitic copepods.
Any further information about them?

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

First time I hear of parasitic copepods.
Any further information about them?

White, red or brown bugs. Any bug that is on acropora flesh is a bad (parasitic copepods) bug. I’ve never seen the dreaded black bugs but I’ve read interceptor can treat those as well.

Fwiw….I saw a post on the moonshiners fb page discussing the destructive power of burrowing spionid worms. I use to have a bunch of these but always heard they were harmless which turns out isn’t the case. They will eventually stress the acro out and kill them. Anyways…..I haven’t seen any sign of them the last couple years after several 2 large interceptor pills/50g treatments

 

[DanyL]

White, red or brown bugs

Huh I wasn't aware they were actually copepods, last time I had red bugs was probably a decade ago.
Never had white or black bugs before though.

the destructive power of burrowing spionid worms. I use to have a bunch of these but always heard they were harmless which turns out isn’t the case. They will eventually stress the acro out and kill them.

Let me ask you a honest question, have you ever lost an Acro to a spionid worm yourself?
Because I heard these tailings go as far back to when I started 15 years ago, and I never really bothered to deal with them. Granted, I never had many and they never spread like some people say, but still I have some acros with spionid worms on their base, where the worms died off over the years but the acros are still here thriving 7-9 years later (Obviously their upper part was cut many, many times over the years, but their bases are the same).

I do acknowledge they irritate corals though, just not enough for this to be a big deal as some people make out of it imo.

 

[billyocean]

Bayer worked the best on preventing bugs but some acros didn’t like it either. I now use potassium chloride to check for aefw and do regular in tank interceptor treatments for parasitic copepods.

Do you use 2 tablespoons per gallon on the PC?

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

Huh I wasn't aware they were actually copepods, last time I had red bugs was probably a decade ago.
Never had white or black bugs before though.

Let me ask you a honest question, have you ever lost an Acro to a spionid worm yourself?
Because I heard these tailings go as far back to when I started 15 years ago, and I never really bothered to deal with them. Granted, I never had many and they never spread like some people say, but still I have some acros with spionid worms on their base, where the worms died off over the years but the acros are still here thriving 7-9 years later (Obviously their upper part was cut many, many times over the years, but their bases are the same).

I do acknowledge they irritate corals though, just not enough for this to be a big deal as some people make out of it imo.

I believe I have but didn’t know it at the time.
Here’s a couple pics that I could find

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

Do you use 2 tablespoons per gallon on the PC?

I tbsp per gallon

 

[DanyL]

I believe I have but didn’t know it at the time.
Here’s a couple pics that I could find

Interesting, hard to tell but possibly true. I can't refute this.
However, I would put more weight on the chemistry and biodiversity of the system, which often plays a big role with their immunity.

For example, I have some Spatulatas that for a long time were irritated by stray palys and mushrooms that I couldn't practically remove, and obviously they didn't let the Acro spread towards them, however the acros thrived otherwise, even though both palys and mushrooms supposedly stung them continuously.
Honestly, I have a feeling they actually stopped stinging each other after a while and simply got used to live In close proximity, because when I removed them recently and looked closely at the base, there were no signs of stinging at all.

It's a very interesting topic by itself tbh, and hopefully with the broad bacterial research that's been going on in recent years we'll have more insights into the relations between them and the immune system that allows acros to better survive in some systems, but not in others.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

Interesting, hard to tell but possibly true. I can't refute this.
However, I would put more weight on the chemistry and biodiversity of the system, which often plays a big role with their immunity.

For example, I have some Spatulatas that for a long time were irritated by stray palys and mushrooms that I couldn't practically remove, and obviously they didn't let the Acro spread towards them, however the acros thrived otherwise, even though both palys and mushrooms supposedly stung them continuously.
Honestly, I have a feeling they actually stopped stinging each other after a while and simply got used to live In close proximity, because when I removed them recently and looked closely at the base, there were no signs of stinging at all.

It's a very interesting topic by itself tbh, and hopefully with the broad bacterial research that's been going on in recent years we'll have more insights into the relations between them and the immune system that allows acros to better survive in some systems, but not in others.

Well I’m glad I don’t see them anymore whether they are harmless or not.

 

[ScottB]

Bayer worked the best on preventing bugs but some acros didn’t like it either. I now use potassium chloride to check for aefw and do regular in tank interceptor treatments for parasitic copepods.

Potassium chloride for the win with acropora. AEFW are not stunned. They are destroyed. But you still have to scrape or glue any eggs.

I did have a few montis that DID NOT like KCl. One tbsp per gallon tank water.

 

[Andyf30]

White, red or brown bugs. Any bug that is on acropora flesh is a bad (parasitic copepods) bug. I’ve never seen the dreaded black bugs but I’ve read interceptor can treat those as well.

Fwiw….I saw a post on the moonshiners fb page discussing the destructive power of burrowing spionid worms. I use to have a bunch of these but always heard they were harmless which turns out isn’t the case. They will eventually stress the acro out and kill them. Anyways…..I haven’t seen any sign of them the last couple years after several 2 large interceptor pills/50g treatments

So for your dosage youre doing 2 of the large dog pills (23mg milbemycin) per 50 gallons? I just followed the 23 mg / 380 gallon for my tank (reefer 170 with around 38 gallons) and it didnt do squat to my white bugs.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

So for your dosage youre doing 2 of the large dog pills (23mg milbemycin) per 50 gallons? I just followed the 23 mg / 380 gallon for my tank (reefer 170 with around 38 gallons) and it didnt do squat to my white bugs.

You would need at least 6, preferably 8 pills for white bugs in a tank that size

wait
Is it 380g or 38g? 1.5-2 pills for 38 gallons

 

[Andyf30]

wait
Is it 380g or 38g? 1.5-2 pills for 38 gallons

38! haha i just meant 380 for the dosage. so each treatment should be 1.5 pills? Dang I really underdosed lol

And I’m assuming its a series of 3 over 3 weeks?

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

You would need at least 6, preferably 8 pills for white bugs in a tank that size

wait
Is it 380g or 38g? 1.5-2 pills for 38 gallons

Make sure you turn off your UV sterilizer, pull out your filter socks, carbon and remove your skimmer cup drain. I like to dose chemiclean so my skimmer foam like crazy. You could also adjust the foam to its highest setting. This keeps the medicine from getting stuck in the skimmer neck, I also turn the uv settings on my lights to zero

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

38! haha i just meant 380 for the dosage. so each treatment should be 1.5 pills? Dang I really underdosed lol

And I’m assuming it’s a series of 3 over 3 weeks?

I did 4 in a row when I had those little ba5tards

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

38! haha i just meant 380 for the dosage. so each treatment should be 1.5 pills? Dang I really underdosed lol

And I’m assuming its a series of 3 over 3 weeks?

My bad. I totally read that wrong. It’s been a long day