Zoa spider found in qt

[Matt Miller]

I've got 4 zoa rocks in qt that have been doing well. 1 faded away to nothing and I have another that's been doing poorly. I finally pulled it out to try to cut off some single polyps to try and save when I found this guy.

I'm not even sure what zoas were on it but I may have saved 1 polyp but I think I'm going to toss the rest just it be safe.

I'm about a week away from moving these to my main tanks and I don't see anything on the other frags. Should I dip them all again before putting in my tanks or just look them all over really good before moving them?

 

[vetteguy53081]

Great ! Did you buy chance buy any coral from California vendor?
There are more than 1300 known species of sea spiders as they are not zoa specific but favor zoa, and almost all of them are carnivores. Depending upon the species, they will feast on your corals, anemones, sponge, etc. These little spiders can decimate a colony pretty quickly. They may be hard to spot, some being as small as 0.04 inches in diameter. They will even crawl inside a closed polyp, making it very difficult to spot (and thats how tiny they are. Some commercial treatments claim to remove pycnogonids but often the case. The spiders tend to stay beneath the mucus layer of the zoas, and remain unaffected by treatments. The best method discovered so far is to physically remove the adults with some tweezers. Keep checking the coral for months afterwards to catch any that hatched over time.
Some crabs will kill them such AS arrow crabs. These spiders do have a few other known predators. It is important that you carry out research before adding any new livestock to your aquarium to ensure they are compatible with your existing stock, and that you can meet their care requirements.
Known predators but not guaranteed include:
-Copperband Butterflyfish
- Butterfly Fish
- Six Line Wrasse
- Melanurus Wrasse
- yellow Coris Wrasse
Additionally, they may live under the coral mucus layer, and this would further obscure them. They do not appear to be easily removed by dips, poisons, or potential predators. Frankly, if they are found on corals in any tank, it can come down to the the best option likely to be to remove the coral from the tank, and simply dispose of it.

 

[Matt Miller]

Great ! Did you buy chance buy any coral from California vendor?
There are more than 1300 known species of sea spiders as they are not zoa specific but favor zoa, and almost all of them are carnivores. Depending upon the species, they will feast on your corals, anemones, sponge, etc. These little spiders can decimate a colony pretty quickly. They may be hard to spot, some being as small as 0.04 inches in diameter. They will even crawl inside a closed polyp, making it very difficult to spot (and thats how tiny they are. Some commercial treatments claim to remove pycnogonids but often the case. The spiders tend to stay beneath the mucus layer of the zoas, and remain unaffected by treatments. The best method discovered so far is to physically remove the adults with some tweezers. Keep checking the coral for months afterwards to catch any that hatched over time.
Some crabs will kill them such AS arrow crabs. These spiders do have a few other known predators. It is important that you carry out research before adding any new livestock to your aquarium to ensure they are compatible with your existing stock, and that you can meet their care requirements.
Known predators but not guaranteed include:
-Copperband Butterflyfish
- Butterfly Fish
- Six Line Wrasse
- Melanurus Wrasse
- yellow Coris Wrasse
Additionally, they may live under the coral mucus layer, and this would further obscure them. They do not appear to be easily removed by dips, poisons, or potential predators. Frankly, if they are found on corals in any tank, it can come down to the the best option likely to be to remove the coral from the tank, and simply dispose of it.

Actually I did get these from a california vendor. I dipped everything in Coral rx and the only 2 that have looked bad had pretty much died off.
I saved 1 polyp from this rock and glued it to another, but am now thinking about just tossing it and watching the others closely.

Thank you for that detailed response, I only have a 13 and 20g dt but will look into those options as well.