Your aiptasia experience/s?

[DJKoop]

My son had a very bad infestaion of them a couple of months ago. He has a 35 gal. tank and nearly every surface was covered. Rock, overflow, pumps, you name it. He bought a Racoon Butterfly and within a month they were all gone. Now the fish nicely eats flake food and is doing great.

[BC564]

I had some little ones poking out at the top of my rock....but I have 3 red legged hermit crabs which seemed to have fixed the problem. I didnt know they even liked the stuff.

[kwirky]

got to Gold's and their peppermint shrimp were inaccessible, hidden inside some rocks. So I got some joe's juice. seems to have done it. I'll know for sure in a couple days. It drove my skimmer crazy though once the pumps started back up.

As for xenia, my pulsing xenia grows like a weed in my tank. Probably means the aiptasia has perfect conditions for it.

[Johnny Reefer]

Originally Posted by DJKoop

..... He bought a Racoon Butterfly and within a month they were all gone. Now the fish nicely eats flake food and is doing great.

Hmmmm. Interesting. Particularly the eating flake food part. Good to know. Thanx for the input.

Cheers,

[Hightower]

Had quite the infestation, to the point it was stinging corals. tried everything including, joes juice, peppermints, vinegar, kalk, hot water all of which would only make a dent in the population or knock them down but not out. They came back with a vengence.

Finally decided to chance with a Copperband butterfly.

Best thing I ever did. within 2 days there wasnt one stitch of aiptasia and to this day there doesnt remain one, and even better than that hasnt touched mt corals.

[rudy]

Thought they were a cool hitchhiker. Turned out to be the biggest mistake I have ever made. I tried everything and eventually left salt as it drove me nuts. I will never have a big enough tank that I can't pull down the day the stuff hits me again.

[safety4fire]

I counted over 100 Aiptasia in my 230g tank mostly medium sized, I got a copperbanded butterfly fish and now most of them are gone. I'm glad I got him.

[briansmyth]

Found calcium hydroxide, not sodium hydroxide as mentioned in this thread, at Home Depot and got all kinds of powder. Mix with water, heat in microwave and check to see if it is the consistency that can be shot through your syringe.

This mix was not as effective as Joes's Juice, say 60% effective versus 90% effective, but it was way less expensive. I keep both on hand. although I've wondered if Joe's Juice loses some of it's effectiveness after it has been opened ... I try to use all of my Joe's Juice within a week of opening it. I have tried vinegar, lemon juice, and hot water and have less than a 30% success rate, I'd estimate.

There are 220 pounds of liverock in our 90 gallon tank, so there are places for aiptasia to grow and not be noticed ... I spend about 20 minutes every month hunting for this pest and also for majano.

Can these pests cause real trouble? Definitely yes. I have a pagoda which has been stung at it's edges by aiptasia, mojano and pulsating xenia - it has never recovered from this. I also have a finger leather coral ( nicknamed Sideshow Bob), it is now 1/6th of it's former size - a very, very small aiptasia was stinging the base of this coral where we couldn't easily see it. I think this coral was weakened enough that other health issues have arisen.

[Cazoom]

aside from calcium hydroxide(heat and serve) as Brian mentions
i won't mess with any other way.. did the vinegar and lemon juice and hot water... and they only spread..insanely!!
the calcium seems to stun them then they dissolve as you inject them..
aside from taking the rock out and running under hot water(yeah it kills everything too!) i have had shrim and coperbands and they didnt work...
would really like to know the success of the nudibranch that eats it though...