Flatworm exit it is!!!!

[fishgeeksrus]

I can understand your frustration. You are very passionate and knowledgable in this field. Unfortunately for me, I am not very good with the scientific names so I have to stick with the more common ones.

Well, I don't want to take this thread into a different direction but I do remember things like that happening to me and my husband...

I can remember when we were sold a bubble tip anemone that turned out to be a long tentacle plate coral. I still laugh at that one.

[fishgeeksrus]

Well after reading over the messages on the link that you supplied, it would definitely be a gamble. They are very hard to keep. Maybe another shot in the dark. I am going to research it a little further. I will definitely keep you posted.

[zhenya]

They were not interested in my explanation; it seemed to make matters worse.

:eek3: I wonder why... Next time you start something they'll probably ask you to leave...
It happened to me few times and to make matters worse the people that were listening to the conversation were on the side of the shop owner and thought that I was "mr. know it all jerk" ;;

[Ninong]

Well after reading over the messages on the link that you supplied, it would definitely be a gamble. They are very hard to keep. Maybe another shot in the dark. I am going to research it a little further. I will definitely keep you posted.

It seems I let something else slip by without commenting on it and that is the fact that this slug is NOT a nudibranch. It's called the "velvet nudibranch" by uninformed LFS employees just as they refer to Elysia crispata incorrectly as the "lettuce nudibranch." Neither is a nudibranch.

Chelidonura varians belongs to the order CEPHALASPIDEA, not NUDIBRANCHIA.

I just wanted to point that out since this stuff gets stored and people read it.




P.S. -- And to expand on why I said this would be an expensive experiment, I would like to say that even if the slug Chelidonura varians does consume your flatworms, it will not find all of them. Then it will die off, unless you remove it first. Once it is dead and gone, or removed, the flatworms will be baaaaack!

[Poseidon]

WOW, I don't know how I missed all this... Ninong I was eluding to Gene's red bugs as far as the dip goes. I should have known better about the dip, worms are pretty mobile so they would be everywhere....

How about a NUCLEAR approach on getting rid of the worms? CAn you set up a holding tank for your livestock, then soak the rock in Flatworm Exit at double or triple strength. Then rinse the rock in freshly made up saltwater before returning it to your tank? So you would have 4 different containers, 1 for holding livestock, 1 for treatment, 1 for rinse, then back to the tank? I knw it sounds like a LOT of work, and I don't even know if it would work 100% but I think that's the course I would take.

Wait... I also remember a LFS telling me a damsel ate flatworms, it was all yellow... let me see if I can find a link... Figures... NO luck, just another LFS LIE, I found a pic of the damsel (Amblyglyphidodon aureus) that was supposed to eat the worms and I can't find any information to back it up... Sorry!

[fishgeeksrus]

Well, we are on the Mississippi Gulf Coast now and I really do not want to think about it. I am truely disgusted about these worms. I have a bunch of frags sitting in my tank that I wanted to sell. No one is going to touch them because of these flatworms now. I really do not want to start over and I'm not sure what to do at this point.

[fishgeeksrus]

The whole thing with these flatworms is, the flatworm exit has killed off most of them but after 2 treatments there are still some survivors. We've sucked as many as we can out and it seems to keep their numbers down to a minimum. They still (even at their worst) haven't taken over the whole tank, just on the sand and starting to get onto the lower pieces of rock. What a crappy way to find out that we should dip our corals in a qt first. Patience is a virtue that we do not have. but we learn it more and more everyday.

[fishgeeksrus]

Okay, we just placed an order for two of the Chelidonura varians. They are suppose to be here on Wednesday. Wish us luck!

[Samper]

I treated today. 20 drops and within 5 minutes what few I could see were scattering everywhere. 10 minutes later a few were falling off the glass. It's been 30 minutes and a few are still moving but they are pale and the movements are more like small bursts of energy. I'm about to add carbon and do a water change within the next 30 minutes. I may treat again tomorrow just for safe measures cause I don't want this to be an ongoing battle.