Tips on Catching Coral Predators

[Reefer37]

So I have had my tank running about a year and half now. I suspect I have a coral eater in my tank. I know it's none of my fish. I have a pair of clowns, a yellow coris wrasse, and a bicolor blenny. My inverts are red legged hermits, one blue legged hermit, astrea, nassarius, trochus snails, and a tiger conch.

I think I might have either an asterina problem or something else. They only seem to be going after my zoas and now my plate. I have tried to find them in my tank multiple times at night after lights out, as that's when I suspect is happening, but haven't found anything. It's been getting worse now and I'm really tired of my zoas losing their skirts and now my plate is missing almost half of body.

Is there a trap or any ideas on what I can do here? Any help would be really appreciated.

Apologies for the algae on the zoas. It's big tank cleaning week this weekend.

 

[Super Fly]

It's probably the Bicolor blenny, it's been known to nip at sps. Fish trap is best way and will be hassle unless u happen to get lucky. For me it took several weeks to remove flame angel that was eating corals. If u use a trap, always put tank lid back and everything else the way it was prior to having added the trap inside tank. For weeks my flame angel was the only fish that wouldnt' enter trap, then when I almost gave up I happened to put the tank lid back and voila the flame angel went inside trap.

 

[Biokabe]

It's probably the Bicolor blenny, it's been known to nip at sps. Fish trap is best way and will be hassle unless u happen to get lucky. For me it took several weeks to remove flame angel that was eating corals. If u use a trap, always put tank lid back and everything else the way it was prior to having added the trap inside tank. For weeks my flame angel was the only fish that wouldnt' enter trap, then when I almost gave up I happened to put the tank lid back and voila the flame angel went inside trap.

If you do need to use a fish trap, one thing that can help a lot is to get some Masstick and put a glob of it inside the trap. I had a hawkfish that I needed to catch, and he wouldn't go into the trap to save his life. Put some Masstick inside, and he was trapped within 5 minutes.

 

[Sam816]

put a wifi cam and check the footage later. once identified plan to catch and remove. or you can buy or DIY some contraption to isolate the coral from other tank inhabitants. it can be as simple as small transparent cup (with some holes) inverted over the corals.

 

[Reefer37]

It's probably the Bicolor blenny, it's been known to nip at sps. Fish trap is best way and will be hassle unless u happen to get lucky. For me it took several weeks to remove flame angel that was eating corals. If u use a trap, always put tank lid back and everything else the way it was prior to having added the trap inside tank. For weeks my flame angel was the only fish that wouldnt' enter trap, then when I almost gave up I happened to put the tank lid back and voila the flame angel went inside trap.

Never once seen this fish nip at any of corals and I work at home and around the tank all day. I've had him for over a year, no issues. Kinda seems weird all of a sudden him going after coral. So very doubtful.

put a wifi cam and check the footage later. once identified plan to catch and remove. or you can buy or DIY some contraption to isolate the coral from other tank inhabitants. it can be as simple as small transparent cup (with some holes) inverted over the corals.

I might have to go this route. I'll try and do some research and see what might be best. It's just kinda hard with all the zoas being pretty on the rock they're on that's a good size.

 

[Sam816]

Never once seen this fish nip at any of corals and I work at home and around the tank all day. I've had him for over a year, no issues. Kinda seems weird all of a sudden him going after coral. So very doubtful.

I might have to go this route. I'll try and do some research and see what might be best. It's just kinda hard with all the zoas being pretty on the rock they're on that's a good size.

can you isolate the rock? if yes then may be move it to sump area or a separate tank. dip the zoas while u r at it.
blennies graze on algae so some time they can nip the coral next to the algae. my bicolor blenny looked like head-banging when grazing on algae.

 

[Super Fly]

Never once seen this fish nip at any of corals and I work at home and around the tank all day. I've had him for over a year, no issues. Kinda seems weird all of a sudden him going after coral. So very doubtful.

I might have to go this route. I'll try and do some research and see what might be best. It's just kinda hard with all the zoas being pretty on the rock they're on that's a good size.tha

from list of livestock, my $ would be on the blenny who appears to be your prime suspect. Many have experienced same issue after adding bicolor to reef tank. My flame angel was a model citizen for over a yr then went nuts and wiped out an entire large rock of GSP that I'd been growing over several yrs, pocillapora and zoas by the time I removed it.

 

[Reefer37]

can you isolate the rock? if yes then may be move it to sump area or a separate tank. dip the zoas while u r at it.
blennies graze on algae so some time they can nip the coral next to the algae. my bicolor blenny looked like head-banging when grazing on algae.

from list of livestock, my $ would be on the blenny who appears to be your prime suspect. Many have experienced same issue after adding bicolor to reef tank. My flame angel was a model citizen for over a yr then went nuts and wiped out an entire large rock of GSP that I'd been growing over several yrs, pocillapora and zoas by the time I removed it.

I heard they can nip corals while grazing for algae from time to time, but half of my plate is missing, so this not just a nip. Something is straight up eating these corals. I've had entire zoas disappear, so I just find it hard to believe he all of a sudden started wanting to eat whole corals. I don't get how the possibility of asterinas is ruled out here considering this is their prime coral diet, specifically zoas.

My tank is an AIO JBJ45, so not really as much of a sump as a small back area and unfortunately the rock won't fit into. We're slowly preparing to move a few months down the road and I've stopped buying corals and fish and took down my second tank to prepare for the move so I can't move it to another tank unfortunately.