Aptasia....Boiling water....Need advice.

[fishguy_8]

Ok i've had it up to here w/ those stupid aptasia anemones....they are toast.....This weekend im quite possibly moving into my new tank. The thing is.....the anemones arent coming with. My question to you is.....do you think this would work......If I were to use my lsb in my existing tank....and put it in the new 40g. is it possible that if i take the rock out of the water for about 20min and collect as many pods, worms, mini stars etc... then dip the rock in the old tank......collect pods etc again....and continue this process.....is it possible for me to collect enough pods and worms from the rock to take and boil the rock for about 10min to kill all life on it and then not have an ammonia spike if i were to put that rock back in the 40g? I've tried everything to rid the anemones except the injecting them w/ kalk and there are so many in such odd places that i could never kill them all off.....this isnt a few dozen anemones were talking about 80-100 anemones at LEAST! I am not over reacting either believe me on this so i just want to be done w/ them. The pepp's didnt make a dent after 3 or 4 months so new measures have to be taken......i'm going for a reef tank and aptasia doesnt go well in my scheme by the way i sprung this weekend. I bought the tank, stand and a set of vho's i'm looking forward to getting an aptasia free environment. Well its time to go to my Animal Diversity class so I had better get going. all advice would be very appreciated.
Thanks
Jon

[JasonL]

Well first off exactly how many pounds of live rock do you have that are covered in aptasia? Because if its more than like 20 - 40 pounds you paid a lot for a rock because that is all your going to have after you boil it.

If you do boil it after you kill everything on and in the rock if you place it back in a tank your ammonia is probably going to be through the roof because you do not have the bacteria to break down any of the waste which will be produced from things that you cannot see in the live rock (well more like dead rock) that is dead. After you boil it I would place the rock in a curing tank for a few days to a week.

Personally I would try the Kalk first if its a large amount of live rock because you are going to kill off a lot of other stuff in the process.
The Kalk option will take some time but after all you did pay for what was in and on the rock. If you are not worried about it purchase new live rock making sure that there is no aptasia on it and maybe boil the other rock and use it as base.

Hope this helps...

Jason

[Dazureus]

Yeah, if you have any coraline alge on the rocks, you're going to end up with very white rocks. I tried to use hot water and a turkey baster to blast the aptasia while still in the tank and it bleached all the coraline in a 0.5" radius. Get a syringe, get some kalk (vinegar works better for me) and inject those puppies. It will be much more pleasing to you to kill the individuals vs mass eradication. Kind of like popping the bubbles in the packaging stuff.

[rwag]

Fishguy
since you will be removing the rocks anyways I think you should try and superglue them. I have had 100% results with this method! no more aiptasia!
Ryan

[fishguy_8]

i bought the rock sight unseen about a year ago. So I inherited them i guess. The guy disappeared after the sale. either way its got alot of life in it and it has good coraline coverage. but the aptasia is too extensive to try and kalk. them all out. We set the tank up in the dining room and the aptasia is deffinitely not allowed. i may try superglue this weekend on one rock and see how good it results in the old tank and decide from there. What type of super glue is acceptable? will the superglue just keep them from extending for a few days or will it be a finalized thing? i just dont know if i could even super glue them all. they can be hard to get at but i'll give it a shot. if you could recommend a brand that is safe i'd really appreciate it. i dont wanna boil off the coraline but if i have to i may have to. its about 20-25lbs i'd guess. thanks for the help.
Jon

[David]

Fishguy_8 : DO NOT boil the rock! I'm surprised to hear that pep shrimp "didn't make a dent", are you sure they are pepermint shrimp? Sometimes camel backs are sold as L. wurdmani, I don't know if they eat aiptasia. Two or three peps should easily wipe out an infestation on 25 lbs LR in a few weeks, especially if you are helping by killing off the big ones you can get to. Can you buy or borrow a Raccoon Butterfly? I eliminated a major infestation on 100 lbs rock with one fish in about three weeks, now the RB is in "rotation", goes from tank to tank (7) as needed to control the suckers. Good luck.

[fishguy_8]

what else do rb's eat? if i got one i wouldnt want to starve it....would it eat prepared foods. I'm positive my "pep's" were peps.....they store had peps and camels in tanks side by side. i had the pep's for quite a few months and as far as i knew they never touched a one. how long are we talking to rid a 25-35lb tank of aptasia? again anyone have any specific types of glue i could use against the aptasia.
thanks for the help everyone
Jon

[David]

I have to admit that the first time I used a raccoon to rid my tank of aiptasia, it starved after eating them all. Several months (and a few more tanks) later I bought another one, which I have had now for about four months. This one readily eats both live and frozen brine and frozen mysis, that's about all I've tried feeding him. I keep him moving from tank to tank so he still gets plenty of aiptasia to eat as well. I have read that this fish is likely to pick at coral polyps and he did in fact kill off some zoanthids, but for the most part he is no prblem.

As far as the glue idea goes, the trick is to seal them into the hole they retract into when disturbed. It never worked very well for me, they popped out of the rock in another spot. Any brand with key component "cyano-acrylate" should do. The gel is easier to work with, even better if kept in freezer (it won't freeze). You can use epoxy putty the same way.