Dipping saves the day.

[skrappy]

Let these images serve as a good reminder to always inspect AND DIP any corals you get before they go in your tank. Inspecting this acro closely under white daylight showed bite marks, but no visible pests, but I know better. Hydrogen peroxide revealed not one, but two types of flatworms; acro eating flatworms and some other type of planarian, and a couple of other smooth worms living in the coral skeleton. DIP YOUR CORALS FOLKS!

 

[jcook54]

I'm curious - what was the ratio you went with to dip these? Have you been dipping with hydrogen peroxide for a while? I always use coral dips but I've only ever dipped zoas in hydrogen peroxide. There's a ratio guide on Humblefish and I'm wondering what yours looks like.

 

[hzheng33]

If you got these flatworms due to the expo yesterday, I ran into the same issue. And I know who the vendor has flatworm because I saw them as soon as I picked up the frags.

Nonetheless, always dip your corals!

 

[skrappy]

I first used hydrogen peroxide 5 or so years ago when I got montipora eating nudibranchs. I don't remember finding any solid recommendations for how much to use, so I put one capful in about 12oz or so of water, and I would dip for 5 minutes, every 7 days. The monti survived the first 3 dips, but after that it died. From that experience I learned that hydrogen peroxide kills almost everything, but a coral can survive for a bit. I have not continued to use it as a regular dip, I usually use one of the common pine oil smelling ones like CoralRX or Revive, and Iodine, along with removing any plugs and going liberal with the glue around the base when putting it on a new plug. I only use hydrogen peroxide now when I can visibly see a problem and know I have to be aggressive. In this instance it was a tort, and I went 2/3 of a jar of salt water, and filled the last 1/3 with the 3% hydrogen peroxide strait from the brown bottle. Dipped in the peroxide saltwater mix for 1 minute while vigorously stirring, the flatworms started dropping off within 10 seconds, last one fell off after about 30 seconds, the worms took the full minute before they were dead. I then rinsed in another glass of tank water, again stirring like crazy to get the peroxide filled slime off the coral. Then I cut the top of the frag off and let it drop into an iodine bath(1 capfull to about 3 cups of tank water), and it sat in there for 5 minutes while I rotated around the whole thing blowing it off with a pipette making sure nothing else came off of it. Threw the plug with the whole bottom of the coral into the trash. This is a picture of the coral this morning, you can see some of the bite marks still even in the bad photos I took, and some chipped tips from it accidently smacking the side of the container while stirring. I expect the chunky piece to survive, but only time will tell.

 

[skrappy]

If you got these flatworms due to the expo yesterday, I ran into the same issue. And I know who the vendor has flatworm because I saw them as soon as I picked up the frags.

Nonetheless, always dip your corals!

It was at the expo, yes. The dim lighting both of the room and of the frag tank made it impossible for me to see them, but as soon as I looked at it in daylight in front of my tank I could see the bites everywhere. I thought really long and hard about tossing the whole thing, but I'm very confident in hydrogen peroxide in combination with a thorough inspection. We'll find out in 6 months if I'm a complete idiot or not, lol. In fairness, my advise to anyone else would have been to throw the whole thing away.

 

[Adam M]

Anybody ever used Bayer's for dipping? I was contemplating using that at some point but was afraid I might get the wrong formula.

 

[hzheng33]

Anybody ever used Bayer's for dipping? I was contemplating using that at some point but was afraid I might get the wrong formula.

that's what i used for the longest time.

only changed to CoralRX because i actually want to see what's on those plugs/corals. the actual amount of CoralRX is so small that i actually don't mind too much of the price difference.

 

[Adam M]

that's what i used for the longest time.

only changed to CoralRX because i actually want to see what's on those plugs/corals. the actual amount of CoralRX is so small that i actually don't mind too much of the price difference.

Nice, I'll have to check CoralRX out.

 

[skrappy]

Coral seems to have survived the heavy peroxide dip just fine, and I haven't seen any bad guys come off of it since. Even the tiny bits have full color and polyp extension still.

 

[billyocean]

Potassium Chloride (KCL) two tablespoons per gallon for 10 minutes will destroy AEFW as well....and it's gentle. Of course for anyone reading this that doesn't know..the eggs will remain un phased.