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Apistasia Infestation

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urchinkiller15

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Discussion starter · #1 ·
Help!:eek: Apistasia are taking over my tank and I am not sure how to get rid of them. I counted ten on one rock and the largest is about one and a half inches long and one inch in diameter. They are also starting to spread and I am afraid they might hurt my new coral. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
 
#2 ·
Buy some joe's juice, or use lemon juice. Put it in a syringe and inject the stuff right into their mouths. Then take the needle and kind of stab the rock a few times while injecting (they will shrink when they sense the needle, so you have to do it quickly). If it's just on one rock I would suggest that you remove it to a quarantine tank until you know that it's all gone.

Peppermint shrimp will (usually) eat the small ones too. Hope that helps...I'm sure others will have more to add. :)

Along the same lines, I just found a huge one at the bottom of my tank, in a cave. I tried injecting it but couldn't reach it. Does anyone have advice for that, other than removing my canopy?
 
#3 ·
I would say that if they are Aiptasia Anemones then a peppermint shrimp would be the best way to get rid of them. The reproduce very fast and the peppermint would be there to eat them as they pop up until they are all gone.

It sounds like a majano anemone to me. they are usually shorter and wider with rounded ends. Aiptasia have pointed ends...

Do a google on them to find which one they are...

-BDR
 
#4 ·
how big is the tank? they can be a good reason to get a copperband butterfly if you like that fish.

otherwise, either a boiling water squirt or some joes juice usually does the trick, temporarily.

i have them too and i really dont care as they dont bother my coral. my euphylia seem to keep them at bay.
 
#7 ·
Done calc and boiling water and lemon juice. Didnt work well. Joes juice is worth the few dollars to battle with them. It does work, but doesnt stop new ones from coming back. Speaking from experiance.

After you kill most, not to mention the ones that will return, buy a few pepermints (3-8) to add to the tank and you should be problem free for a good long time. Not to mention, you wont have to be extreamly picky about adding more rock next time around, or the hitchiker aptaisias in the future.

Then when all is said and done, you still have some cool shrimp and no problem aptasias.

I am now aptasia free for the exeption of teenie tiny ones that come up here and there, and have some cool cleaner crew in my tank. Just added the peppermints 2 weeks ago and have gone from over 100 aptasias in a 34 gallon to about 2 tiny aptasias that have sprung up since, with the combo of joes juice and pepermints to take care of the laft overs.

Never know, with more than 2 weeks time, the peppermints might just deal with the problem till there is no problem before they die.

Yhe reason for 3-8 shrimp to deal with the aps is because aptasia eating peps is somtimes hit or miss. With the addition of this many, odds are your problem will be taken care of.

Hope this helps. It helped me out sooooo much! Just find a good cheap source of peppermints and get some joes juice and start the battle!
 
#8 ·
I would like to add that you should feed your tank sparingly when trying to rid your aquarium of Aptasia for two reasons:

1. Aptasia will feed off of excess food and reproduce much more rapidly

2. Peppermint shrimp will almost always go for fish/coral food over Aptasia. Its a choice for them like McDonalds or Filet Mingon is for us. McD's being the Aptasia and fish food being the Filet. They'll almost always go for the Filet.

Whenever I get more than a few Aptasia growing, I stop feeding my tank until they are gone, granted I only have one fish currently that is a heck of a scavenger anyway. If you have many fish, cut your feeding in half for at least three days. Or just be very carefull when you feed and make sure every piece of food goes into a fishs' mouth (this is good practice in general). I wouldn't feed corals until Aptasias are gone.

I find that a lot of times when people have peppermints that aren't doing their job by eating Aptasia, they are providing too much alternate food to the shrimp. Once the Aptasias are gone... great! Feed the heck out of them!
 
#10 ·
use kalk or joe's juice to kill the big ones and then buy some peppermint shrimp's. oh importent to know you must cut down the amount you feed your tank when useing peppermints, because if they are well fed they wont eat your Aptasia's. :D
 
#11 ·
with the couple local stores selling peppermints for 5 for $15... I'd pick up 4-6 for your sized tank, they should demolish the aptasia's. Just cut back your feeding a little and that should encourage them to mow down on your pest anemone's.
 
#12 ·
Yeah...I agree. I tried one pep shrimp and nothing. I added five in my 135 gallon, and I may have one aptasia left. They do the trick. Try feeding every other day when you put them in. If they have alternate food sources, they will be slow on the aptasia. It took about a week or two.
 
#14 ·
stunreefer said:
I would like to add that you should feed your tank sparingly when trying to rid your aquarium of Aptasia for two reasons:
Click to expand...
I would try other methods, not feeding puts a huge strain on your fish and corals both. Once fish become undernourished they can get sick very easy and are hard to get back to healthy. In my opinion under feeding is never an answer. Maybe you can go in a group buy for Berghia nudibranchs, the one sure method to eliminate aiptasias, because Berghia nudibranchs only eat aiptasias, you will completely get rid of them and maybe just keep passing them around to other MR's that need their service. The other methods mention may do it, but there is a chance that they won't be effective, also if you have larger aiptasia's, there is a good chance peppermint shrimps won't help. There are exceptions to all rules, so you might get lucky and have good luck with other methods, but with the Berghia nudibranchs, your chance of success is very good. Do a Google search, there are a couple of online places to buy them and sometimes Pruess's have them as well.

Dan
 
#15 ·
My mom had aptasia severe in her tank. It was growing like grass. After a year of trying to get rid of it(copperband, shrimp, joe's juice, ect) nothing worked permanently, they always found a way of coming back. There could be micro-scopic one's you can't even see and they will re-grow. After a year of frustration she took out all her rock, sand, cleaned and lightly bleached and dried out everything, cleaned and dried out her tank and sump, and filters. She didn't have any coral at the time. Yes, she basically started over and killed everything off. But, hoping this would finally do the job, she put everything back in and started over. Then a few weeks later, APTASIA!!!! AGAIN!!!!!!! This stuff is impossible to completley kill, trust me, my mom is living proof. All I would suggest is get rid of whatever rock that you see aptasia on, including the rock with coral, and don't put it back in your tank. Trust me on this one. My mom even put the pieces in a seperate tank with 10-15 peppermint shrimp, when all the aptasia was gone, she put it back in her tank, and the teeny, tiny aptasia the shrimp missed, came back. She still has a problem with aptasia in her tank today. Its been well over a year of her going to extremes of killing all her live rock and live sand, its still there. Hope this helps.
 
#18 ·
I have been at war with Aiptasia since the day I set my tank up - last July. There have been many battles in this long war, many ups and downs. I have beaten them into submission only to have them return in great numbers a week later.

I have changed strategies several times. Joes juice, lemon juice, hot water, a peppermint shrimp, 2 peppermint shrimp, etc

Many different tactics - all ending in failure. These pests are durable and have sustainability like nothing I have ever seen before. They seem to come from nowhere just when you think you have their backs to the wall. I have come close to throwing in the towel so many times, but the mere sight of one of these beasts just upsets me to no end and I must continue the fight.

With all of that said, in one last desperate attempt to rid myself of this enemy that has come so close to driving me insane, I added 4 peppermint shrimp. 2 I bought from hardcz, and 2 from Choice Aquariums. At first, it didnt look good. They didnt seem to pay any attention to the Aptasia and they spent most of their time trying NOT to become dinner for my cleaner shrimp. I thought, the heck with it, let the cleaner eat these spineless shrimp - they are not pulling their weight in this war anyhow.

Then, in a moment of weakness, I set up my quarenteen tank and put my cleaner shrimp into it. I dont know if it was this act of kindness that prompted my peppermint shrimp to join the fight or if it was just pure coincidence. The next morning, I noticed one of the toughest warriors of Aiptasia was disappeared. Could it be? Did they eat it, or was it just holed up waiting to surprise attack once more? After some time, I noticed fewer and fewer of these great Aiptasis warriors in my tank. I am now at a point where I feel we are close to victory in this long, hard war. I am still being cautiosley optimistic as I have been surprised by their dormant tactics before. They will lie in wait until you let your gaurd down and BAM, they strike with a vengeance!!

I will keep these peppermint shrimp in my tank for another week or 2, maybe 3 just to be safe before I declare victory.

Once I am confident we are victorious in this war, I will pass these great warrior peppermint shrimp on to another desperate reefer to fight again. We will rid our tanks of these pests with peppermint shrimp - in the trenches, leading the way.
 
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