red bugs

[bowkry]

I just noticed red bugs in my tank all over one of my frags how do I kill them!!!!!!!!!!

[chandigz]

Interceptor. You have to get it thru prescription from a vet. I can be hard to get sometimes. Print off info and take it in. Most vets aren't familliar with the treatment and some won't prescribe it. Try to find a vet that deals with exotics or has experience with fish disease as they will be most likely to give it to you.

[bowkry]

Will any of the wrasses eat them or will fresh water dips work

[christyf5]

No wrasses eat them that I know of, they're just too small. There have been reports that dragon pipefish eat them but the pipefish are a hard to keep species I think. Freshwater dips will kill some but not all, they're hardy little buggers and the length of time it takes to kill them you'll likely kill the coral. If you're not treating the whole tank (with interceptor) the acros will have to be removed from the tank for at least 5 days to kill any remaining red bugs (ie, remove their food source). I think people have reported success with tropic marin pro coral cure but again, I don't know if its 100%. I have used interceptor successfully many times and its the only treatment I would use and is the easiest for treating the entire tank without removing all acros from the tank and putting them in quarantine.

[bowkry]

will it harm any of my shrimp or any other inverts?

[christyf5]

That is a bit of a toss up. The only thing that it ever killed in my tank was acro crabs, any other crabs seemed to survive it. I didn't have any shrimp in my tank as I had a wrasse that regarded them as tasty snacks. You may see a few copepod bodies floating around in the currents afterwards but for the most part my copepod populations seemed to be fine/rebounded quickly.

Oh, it will probably kill starfish, I had a red fromia that went missing around that time, I'm pretty sure the interceptor did it in. I think urchins are fine though (tuxedo).

[whatcaneyedo]

Theres a good article on how to treat here: http://www.melevsreef.com/redbugs.html

The Reef Aquarium Vol 3 by Delbeek and Sprung has some more advice and would be an even better item to bring it to your vet as proof of what you want to do with the product. Look on page 648.