Aiptasia control

[ocean diver]

What is the best way to control Aiptasia? I would like to hear what has worked for other people? Control by fish, shrimp, nudibranch, chemical or any combination.

[chromakey]

Hi:

I originally had a matted filefish in the tank and it controlled all the aiptasia in the tank. I did have some left in the overflows. I got rid of him because he was eating some of my zoas.

I did use Aiptasia-X for the few that did pop up but I had to treat them 2 or 3 times. I guess if you don't get it in their mouth before they close up it is not 100% effective.

I haven't tried peppermint shrimp.

Michael

[Reef Pilot]

Pearlscale Butterfly fish did the job for me. My tank initially had hundreds (live rock and back glass were covered in them), and it took them a few months, but the Pearlscales completed decimated the aiptasia. And they don't bother my corals either. Plus a beautiful fish, too. Have had them for 3+ years now.

[mark]

can say 100% matted filefish work, never can keep shrimp long enough to say (blaming the 6 line), kalk paste just knocks them back for a bit.

[darkreef]

I have a reef with the same problem. What's reef safe and kills these things .
I have a dwarf lion so no shrimps

[brotherd]

Pearlscale Butterfly fish did the job for me. My tank initially had hundreds (live rock and back glass were covered in them), and it took them a few months, but the Pearlscales completed decimated the aiptasia. And they don't bother my corals either. Plus a beautiful fish, too. Have had them for 3+ years now.

I put in 2 butterfly fish. They decimated the aiptasia. And 2 brains. And 2 birdnest corals. Can't catch them yet. I strongly urge caution. They pick at everything :twised:

[Reef Pilot]

I put in 2 butterfly fish. They decimated the aiptasia. And 2 brains. And 2 birdnest corals. Can't catch them yet. I strongly urge caution. They pick at everything :twised:
Yes, that is true for most butterfly fish, but these are Pearlscales, and none of them have bothered my corals.

[freeze]

I have two peppermint shrimp and they go mad for the stuff. Have zero issues with it.

[hillbillyreefer]

I picked up a filefish yesterday to deal with an aiptasia problem. Haven't had much luck with peppermints or nudibranchs.

[monocus]

berghia are the only ones that are totally reef safe.they take time,but are effective

[Doug]

Yes, that is true for most butterfly fish, but these are Pearlscales, and none of them have bothered my corals.


Clams also?

[ocean diver]

I have tried the filefish....eat my acans and zoas and NO aiptasia, sold him. Tried a couple peppermint shrimp...never seen them since putting them in...no change to aiptasia. Tried injecting with vinegar...seem to have more now!! So still looking for a solution..............

[Reef Pilot]

Clams also?
Never had any clams, so can't speak to that. And I should also mention that I just didn't plunk the Pearlscales directly into my display tank, and say have at it...

I always put new fish through QT with the hypo routine, which can take up to 3 months. During that time, I trained the Pearlscales onto first frozen mysis, then dried foods incl various freeze dried, pellets, and even flake. But also, I put in a rock with some aiptasia on it, first to see if they would go for it. They did, and when one figured it out, the others would join in. So I kept doing that, giving them an aiptasia rock every once in a while, and in the mean time fattening them up on dried food, with the occasional frozen mysis treat (can't give them too much of that or they won't eat the dry stuff).

Then I added them to the display tank, where they first had to deal with my bully yellow tang. But they are pretty quick, and he could never corner one, and eventually gave up. But they immediately recognized the aiptasia, and didn't hesitate to rip them out of their holes. And since they were used to the dried foods, took to that right away in the display tank as well.

But they never went after my corals. Initially I only had LPS (frogspawn, bubble coral, etc) and softies (mushrooms, leathers, etc). Later I added SPS frags, and I was a little nervous at first, because they really looked over a new frag initially, and would sometimes nip off the slime filaments. But they never went after the polyps. I have softies, LPS and lots of SPS in my tank now, and they don't bother any of them. But the good news, is they continue to keep my tanks free of aiptasia (for 3 years now).

I would not be surprised if they left clams alone as well. I really think what made it work for me, was first training them on other foods and aiptasia in the QT tank. I may not have been so lucky, if they went straight into the display tank.

[Slyguy00]

I had 2 peppermint shrimp. They didn't touch my aptasia but sure ate a lot of my acans. I know most people don't seem to have luck with aptasia x but it works for me every time.

[mark]

Never had any clams, so can't speak to that. And I should also mention that I just didn't plunk the Pearlscales directly into my display tank, and say have at it...

I always put new fish through QT with the hypo routine, which can take up to 3 months.

don't think most would have that commitment to train a fish labelled "not reef safe" when there's other methods of aptasia control. Know I don't.

[Reef Pilot]

don't think most would have that commitment to train a fish labelled "not reef safe" when there's other methods of aptasia control. Know I don't.

People will believe what they want on the internet and are free to make their own choices. I am just offering my direct experience with these fish, because I know they are not well known. I found out about them after my own research on the internet and other people's experiences as well.

I am also a strong believer in the hypo QT routine, and if people are not willing to make that commitment, then they should not buy these fish (or any other for that matter).

I will say, though, that I have had a total of 5 Pearlscales over time, and all of them were the same, so it was not a one-off. I have also tried many of the other popular control methods, and this is the only one that worked long term for me. Plus I have a couple of peaceful, beautiful fish additions to my tanks.

[hillbillyreefer]

People will believe what they want on the internet and are free to make their own choices. I am just offering my direct experience with these fish, because I know they are not well known. I found out about them after my own research on the internet and other people's experiences as well.

I am also a strong believer in the hypo QT routine, and if people are not willing to make that commitment, then they should not buy these fish (or any other for that matter).

I will say, though, that I have had a total of 5 Pearlscales over time, and all of them were the same, so it was not a one-off. I have also tried many of the other popular control methods, and this is the only one that worked long term for me. Plus I have a couple of peaceful, beautiful fish additions to my tanks.

I don't think mark was taking a shot at you. He was saying your dedication to training these fish is a method he wouldn't have the time or patience for. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.

[Reef Pilot]

I don't think mark was taking a shot at you. He was saying your dedication to training these fish is a method he wouldn't have the time or patience for. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.
Sorry if I am seeming a little sensitive to that. But I guess I see too much of that on these forums. People love to peddle popular opinions on these threads, some of which are downright bad advice, and don't offer any direct experience of their own with appropriate explanations.

I can sit back and not say anything, and watch people struggle with bio pellets, cyano, aiptasia, phosphates, ich, SPS, etc, or I can try to help. Sometimes I do wonder if it is worth the effort...

[pinkreef]

i have file fish in my tank and no aptasia downside they eat skirts of palys and zoes. Of course if you remove the fish the aptasia comes back:wink:

[Coasting]

ive tried stabbing aiptasia with needles before... never worked. So now I just superglue over them.

[asylumdown]

Once aiptasia are in a system, they're next to impossible to eliminate completely. They're used as a model organism in science research for a reason...

You can check out this poll from a while back to see what people have tried and how successful they were:
http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=98808

That said, the way I look at it you should approach them hierarchically. Not every control method is appropriate for every tank, and there things that you can do but are less than ideal for several reasons. Here's my hierarchy, and why:

step 1. Berghia nudibranchs - they are the most expensive, but also the most effective with the least side effects. I say they should be tried first because peppermint shrimp, if they fail to eat your aiptasia, most certainly will eat your berghia, so if you try peppermint shrimp first you're shooting yourself in the foot unless you can get the shrimp out if they fail. Depending on how large your tank is, it can take a while for berghia to reach critical mass. You need to give them a good three months to do their thing before you consider them either a success or failure. The sample size is small, but there was an 80% failure rate with berghia if predators such as peppermints were added first, compared to a 67% success rate with Berghia if there were no predators present. You also need a large aiptasia problem for berghia to make sense, because there needs to be enough aiptasia to support at least 2 or 3 generations of increasing numbers of berghia. The visual effect of this is quite striking: for the first 1 to 2 months, it seems like nothing is happening and you never see the nudis and the aiptasia might actually get worse. However, once critical population masses have been reached and your 2nd and 3rd generation start to mature, entire rocks will suddenly be cleared of aiptasia over night. It advances in a wave until they're all gone. You'll need to help the nudis out by moving some to the overflows and the areas of your sump you need them in, and as the aiptasia population crashes you'll start seeing nudi's floating around your tank at night as they let go of the rocks to try and find food. You can catch them and sell them at that point. I made 3x what I paid for my starter population by selling them when I ran out of aiptasia.

Step 2. Peppermint shrimp - If after 3 months you haven't seen the berghia again and the aiptasia problem has not improved/gotten worse, these guys seem to be the least risky second option, with the least number of ethical concerns. By and large this is the most common thing people use to try and control aiptasia. According to the poll they have a similar success rate as berghia, approximately 67%, but I'm hesitant to put them on the same level because the sample size for berghia was so small. I suspect that if more people had tried Berghia first, it would have had a higher rate of success.

Step 3. An appropriate fish predator - This is tricky because not all fish are appropriate for all systems. If yours is a zoanthid tank, you really don't want to put a file fish in there because there's a good chance it will eat things you paid for. Butterfly's can be difficult to acclimate, have a high mortality rate (and thus have ethical drawbacks), may not be reef safe depending on what 'reef' means to you, and have minimum tank size considerations. However, a proven aiptasia eating copper band butterfly that also eats prepared foods and is a healthy weight is worth its weight in gold in any reef tank in my opinion. Plus they're awesome fish.

84% of people achieved successful aiptasia control with a matted filefish (though many have stated obvious drawbacks and side effects), 69% reported success with a copper band butterfly, and 80% reported success with a raccoon butterfly. Take that last one with a grain of salt, and the total sample size is 6. It's hard to say if a raccoon BF is actually any better of an aiptasia predator than a CBB.

I suspect some of the failures of the CBB were cases where they were added to tanks when the aiptasia problem is already out of control, as I've noticed that my CBB doesn't like to eat aiptasia after they reach a certain size. After berghia cleared my display and most of my sump, I added a copper band. The berghia missed a single aiptasia in the sump before they all starved or were sold, and now a year later my sump and my overflows are aitpasia gardens, but I've only got 2 or 3 largish aiptasias in the display. I credit the CBB for that.

Step 4 - manual removal using one of the chemical methods available (calk paste, joes juice, some acid you inject etc.). Based on the poll they all have darn near 50% success rate, which is pretty crappy considering that it's effort that you are personally investing, can potentially mess with water chemistry, and can require a tremendous amount of time and muscle work on your part to see success. Generally speaking, any time you ask the human owner of the tank to fill the ecological role of pest predator, it's going to be a frustrating and inefficient experience. If you've got 1 or 2 aiptasia, I'd maybe try that method first, but don't be fooled in to thinking it worked when you don't see the aiptasia the next day. They can regenerate entire animals from a single cell, so what is more often the case is that where you 'killed' it with some substance, 3 or 4 teeny tiny little baby aiptasias sprang up, but wandered off before they were big enough to see (they can move quite far in a short period of time). For a month you think you've got the problem licked, then suddenly you notice two more on the other side of the rock and you think you just missed them. From that point on it's next to impossible to stay ahead of it manually, and 6 months later you'll have more aiptasia than rock, you'll hate your tank, and all you've really done is helped them.

Don't even bother wasting money on one of the ridiculous aiptasia zapper devices out there. According to the small sample size of the poll they have a 100% failure rate. They sound like a good idea, but they're expensive and in reality they never work right. The only aiptasia they are capable of completely killing are ones that are polite enough to bee growing on the glass completely accessible on all sides. The second you turn on the juice, any aiptasia in the rock retract like lighting, meaning the best you can do is singe some tentacles.

I'd say a better method if you've only got one aiptasia on one rock is to completely remove the rock and sterilize it, while taking care to not disturb that anemone in the process. No piece of live rock is worth the trouble these things cause, and after it's bee dried, boiled, dipped in bleach, what have you, you can re-use the rock. You still might not get them as aiptasia move a surprising amount, leaving tiny little pedal lacerations behind them everywhere they go, but if I had exactly 1 aiptasia and it was small, complete removal of that rock would be my choice.

[LoJack]

Now that's a thorough reply. Way to go Asylum!

And I'd have to agree, there isn't much there to dispute at all … those are the facts people.

My piece is that the only success I've had is with a copper band as well. I have never tried the berghia method, because with my location, they are even more expensive to try and locate and ship up here. But as with most butterfly's, my Copperband didn't make it until the job was done, and I'm dealing with a full revolt of Aiptasia now.

He had reduced my aiptasia from hundreds … to not visible. But after he perished, there must have been some little ones in some deep dark crevices I couldn't see … because they mounted a comeback.

I've been on the lookout for a new copper band ever since … but they are tough to find eating, and if they aren't eating frozen in the lfs … the fail rate is like 99% with these beautiful fish. They are devoted though, I'm a picky eater … but not picky enough to starve myself to death lol

[ocean diver]

Thank you everyone for the thoughts on this problem with Aiptasia, I will keep you all posted as to who or what wins the fight!!!!!