Log Of Berghia Nudibranch Erradicating Aptasia Infestation

[putemup]

Hey Dakota,
A couple of questions for you....I have what looks like 20 baby aptasia in my main display tank and I see 2 babies in my refugium (on a piece of rock).

I have some Joe's juice on the way (it should be in tomorrow). I'm going to try that on them first. Then add my shrimp. but if all else fails I'm going to purchase some berghia as well. Maybe 2 or 3 max since I don't have a lot of aptasia yet.

My question is where is a good place to purchase them from? I located a site called berghia.net and I'm going to check with Scientific Atlanta. Any other suggestions?

And to confirm the only eat aptasia not any other corals or fish?

 

[dakota9]

They ONLY eat aiptasia. After the aiptasia are gone, they will then starve to death unless removed from the system, to another system where aiptasia are present. This is taken from virtually every source I've ever read on the subject.

You could ask Purplegorilla what vendor he originally purchased these through, or just go with Scientific Coral since they are a sponsor.

Rather than Joe's Juice, a BETTER and actually CHEAPER alternative is Acroholic's Napalm (lye) recipe. It's great stuff.

If more information about Berghia interests you, try saltyunderground.com , they have a lot of information regarding Berghia on that site. Most of it is fact, with a little hype thrown in for salesmanship, a necessary evil..... LOL

 

[purplegorilla]

Pics would be great. I haven't seen any of mine. :sad:

 

[putemup]

Since I just got my tank back running a little over a week ago and the fact that I only see about 20 small aptasia in the tank, I heard that simply removing my rock from the tank and burning the aptasia with a tourch would work as long as I burned it all away. Any comments. I have nothing in my tank except rocks and sand.

 

[dakota9]

It's been 3 1/2 months, and while it looked like they were making great headway for a while, the Berghia do not seem to be eradicating the aiptasia.

Aiptasia were greatly on the decline a little more than a month ago, but recently, they are popping up everywhere again with no sign of the Berghia.

I know several of the original population survived, and at least one second generation of beghia hatched in my tank as I found juvenile Berghia 2 months after the introduction.

If the population faltered, I question why as no changes have been made in the system. The only thing I can think of is shortly after the holidays, I did some minor re-aquascaping (only on the top layer of rock as the base rock was not disturbed. While re-aquascaping, I carefully looked for any Berghia, but did not see any.

I plan on checking for them one last time tonight, but barring any Berghia activity, I'll be picking up a good supply of peppermint shrimp Keen Reef tomorrow.

 

[dakota9]

So, I decided to try Peppermints after the Berghia failure. I called Tim and asked him how many Peppermints I could safely add to my 30 cube, he said "until antenna stuck out of the water...... I bought 12.

12 Peppermints $49.00


4 Berghia $60.00


That's roughly one Peppermint Shrimp per 2.5g of water capacity in my tank, and after slightly less than a month, I count two Aiptasia left in my tank. That is down from countless, very possibly hundreds of aiptasia 6 months ago.

I had really hoped the Berghia were going to succeed, but in retrospect, the tried and true method worked.

I do think that the Berghia are a viable option for people who can afford them. They may well have eradicated the aiptasia if the infestation had not been so bad. Maybe if I could have afforded 12 Berghia for my tank instead of four, but who has 180.00 to spend on livestock you may never see again without the use of a flashlight?. As more people start breeding them for profit, and the price comes down to the price of Peppermint Shrimp, I think they will add a lot to this hobby, but right now, they still seem to be too pricey to be a viable option to most people.