Somebody Shoot Me, I almost had enough

[JEMichael IV]

Well, my battle with Aiptasia is really getting to my nerves. I seriously dont want to continue battling. I mean I dont want them to win but damn this is quite annoying!

I am managing to keep them from spreading to the front of my tank which is a good thing as this is where all my corals reside.

BUT there are hundreds along the back of the rockwork. Cant see them from the front which is good for when company comes over

BUT BUT not good as I dont want to keep battling them. I Kalk, Boil Water, they come back with something fierce! I think its a counterattack but it is really P****ing me off.

I mean I am not a bad reef keeper nor a person and I dont feel I deserve this. I have been keeping a reef for 3 years now. This problem really went sour after I moved my tank and switched to a DSB. This was 4 months ago. I now have a healthy pod population (you should see the homemade video I got of hundreds of them moving about the capulara, if you want to see it I can post a link here after I put it on my computer from my Camera) and I have all the right equiptment use RO/DI feed twice a day (in morning and night).

My tank is a 100g with 2x400w MH (12k Sunbursts) and 4 110w Actinics. I use a Lifereef Skimmer and the tank has a builtin overflow. I have 250lbs of Sand and 100 lbs of rock.

Here is a picture of a part of the rockwork on the back. Please NOTE: The following picture is not for the weak of heart.
Link to Picture

[bertoni]

Have you considered using Berghia nudibranchs?

[JEMichael IV]

Yes I have but what am I to do after there done?

John

[mastaJ]

WOW!

With the 'branchs, I'd line up someone after you to trade or whatever...IF you go that route (I've never tried them) HTH

[bongobrian]

Ya know what, that pic actually looks pretty cool if you can forget what you are looking at!

I'm sorry you gotta deal with that... major suck dude. Have you considered a copperband butterfly fish? or how about a peppermint shrimp? You could always try it the good ol fashioned way and inject them with boiling water or calcium. Good luck man!

[FishDaddy]

John,
You got some major Aip's there!
I fought the rascals after I first set my 55 up; did the Kalk; Stop-Aiptasia; etc., which was effective for individuals that I could reach, but the ones in back, like yours, couldn't be gotten.
A couple of Peppermint shrimp (Lysmata wurdemanni) did the job and they haven't been back!
For your size tank, 4 or 5 ought to do the job.
For more info on Aiptasia control, see:
http://www.wyx.com/iheo/tank/aiptasia.htm
HTH,
Dick

[bertoni]

I don't have a lot of experience, but my peppermints did in fact
remove the aiptasia I had. I guess I thought the Berghia would
do the major removal, and the peppermints could keep it clean.

[WannaBeAReefer]

I was paranoid when I saw some very small aptaisia tried the syringe thing... that works well for ones you can access, however, I believe for everyone you can see there are 4 more out there.... so I bought 3 pep's for a 104G tank and they cleaned it all up within a week... I highly recommend the pep's.

[JEMichael IV]

Well I have 3 nice sized peps in there right now. I thought about the nudibranchs but I was worried after they were done that they would just perish. That isnt far.

[FishKid]

wow i thought i was bad off, thats horible, but mine isnt far behind, i got some gigantic ones i am putting serious thought into bergia...

[JEMichael IV]

Well I just ordered some Sodium Hydroxide from Science Alliance, when it gets here, I am going on a killing spree.

[David]

Yea, I had it like that in my 125. I removed all corals I really cared about and all fish so I didn't have to feed tank. Then I added one raccoon butterfly and ten pepermint shrimp. Three weeks later I couldn't find an aipatsia with a magnifying glass, been that way for a few months now. I did have to try twice to get a healthy raccoon though, the first one only lived a week or so.