Flatworms - To Nuke or control with a fish

[gmpolan]

I figured id provide an update for those interested in this route.
Went and grabbed a corse wrasse from Pure and decided id try him out in my frag tank, which is tied to everything, before putting him in the display. Thank goodness i did because as three weeks now, with no food, he still does not touch the flats.

Back to step one...

 

[sts04c]

Geoff,

Try the Melanurus man, CUC always needs replacing/supplementing anyways.

 

[gmpolan]

Im thinking of nuking the tank actually versus throwing in another hit or miss fish.
Especially since i just added a potters wrasse to the display, so we will see.

 

[sts04c]

I hear ya. I know the feeling of just wanting it all cleansed, but some frag or something could always bring it back too. Good luck either way man!

 

[chris s]

gmpolan;821964 wrote: I figured id provide an update for those interested in this route.
Went and grabbed a corse wrasse from Pure and decided id try him out in my frag tank, which is tied to everything, before putting him in the display. Thank goodness i did because as three weeks now, with no food, he still does not touch the flats.

Back to step one...

Are you going to keep him? I'm interested in buying, I was planning on getting one this weekend. I've wanted to try a yellow coris to help control my bristleworm population. Let me know.

 

[gmpolan]

I havent fully decided yet, i might let him be a few more weeks. Pure has tons of them in the reef tank...

 

[hiimsean]

If you don't mind me asking but how much an how large? Been looking for one for a while.

 

[acroholic]

Melanurus Wrasse works great. Beautiful fish. I have one in my 465. Great reef citizen, but I don't care if it eats pods or small snails. It leaves the turbos alone.

 

[gmpolan]

Thanks dave/scott, i might switch out the corse and try one in the frag for a while.

Corse - is about 2 plus inches and i might ask 15 -20 i dunno.

 

[softhammer]

I have used Salifert Flatworm exit many times to no ill effect. Do it prior to your next water change and run a little carbon. Works ridiculously well! Also a mandarin will slurp those things up if you don't want to run chemicals.

 

[gmpolan]

Figured id post an update - Used flatworm exist and saw very little to null effect on the flatworm population. I might need to dose again but the size listed on the bottle was for 200 plus gallons i think and my total system is close to 580. So i figured ill need to up the dose...

Also tried using a yellow corse wrasse and six line in the frag tank, no feeding, and neither have touched them. Back to the drawing board....

 

[dr_ fish]

I started noticing flatworms in my tank a few months ago and their numbers were quickly rising.

I added a cryptic six line wrasse in attempts to have it eat all the flatworms. After a few weeks I still never saw him eat one nor were my numbers of the worms declining. Randomly several weeks to a month later I noticed out of the blue I hadn't seen any flatworms in awhile. Something had eaten every last one of them, I still havent seen a single worm in months.

My point is that it may take awhile for either you to notice they are being eaten or for the fish to get the idea to eat them.

 

[gmpolan]

Both fish have been in the system for a couple months and i am sampling in a 50 gallon frag bar bottom where i could physically see.....it honestly doesnt look like much improvement from the naked eye

 

[enderg60]

Well if its any consolation, I just wasted 3 bottles of flatworm exit on my tank and apparently the ones I have are resistant so melanerus wrasse it is!

Ive always had them and they dont hurt anything(little brown ones) I just never noticed them till they were everywhere in my frag tank. I never saw them in the display because of the melanerus though.

Oddly they even survived my crash, and multiple freshwater dips, interceptor dips, lugals dips, and flatworm exit dips.

 

[hiimsean]

i had some in my 5.5g that i broke down. i went a bit excessive with coral rx but they all died. im not sure you want to use coral RX on a while system though

 

[gmpolan]

Yeah my other issue is every keeps saying melanarus, but there is a red fin, potters, two flame wrasses and im not sure i need another large wrasse. Hence why i tried the yellow corse and six line but not sure what else to do.

 

[enderg60]

I had a trio of flames, capenters, solerensis and a few other wrasses and the only one the melanerus ever fought with was the christmas wrasse. They did not like each other at all.

 

[gmpolan]

What size tank?