Well, I guess if they're motivated, they're like a fast snail, but no faster than that.
You should check out the links for pics of pests in the first post on this thread, it might help you ID what you're looking at.

Also, are you really a Giant?

Okay, this thing is way faster than a snail. I checked out the links, but my eyes don't have macro mode, so I can't always tell if it is the same thing :-)

I did see a big, slower moving thing that looked like a rollie-pollie, but I don't think it was a nudi.

As far as GiantBen, I'm 6' 215, so maybe bigger than I should be, but not a giant :-P

It's the handle I use for fantasy football and fantasy baseball, so I just carried it over to here. SF Giants fan. And yes, I know they have no lineup.


Thanks for the info.

Rolly Polly dude is most like an amphipod.
Nudi's look like slugs with spikes or ruffles on their backs.
Your eyes prolly don't work in macro mode cause they're Giant eyes.
(sry, sense of humor is a lil quirky tonight, I'm too tired. )

Yeah, I wasn't sweating the rolly polly. GiantEyes...lol

Sooooo.....

I come home from work today and one of my corals is shriveled and looking much like death. I see a brown thing crawling all over the zoa heads. This coral was a freebie that I got, which I like okay, but certainly care about my other zoas more. In my thread I forgot to take a picture of the one this one, which might be saying something, but you can at least see the ones I like. I am pretty concerned about the things (nudis I think) getting on my other zoas, so I freshwater dip this thing. Hastily. Hastily as in the water was pretty cold. 3-4 of the nudis died off the in the bowl, but the coral looks pretty bad too. It is spewing junk out of its heads, but these are actually starting to open a little and some of them have some color. I'll take a pic later if I can.

Question:
Can the zoa bother other zoas if it is not doing well? It is somewhat by itself in a sea of dynoflagellates (UGH that's another story), so will it be okay to leave it in there and see how it does?

Can the dynoflagellates be a problem for zoas o the sand? I have 4 down there and none of them but this one are having any problems.

Thanks.

Is it worth trying to get rid of Amphipods? I see quite a few of these running around at night. The zoas close up when run on,but are otherwise okay. I'm not sure how I would get rid of the, as they are in multiple places. Anything that will eat them?

Don't worry bout the pods unless you're sure they're eating your zoas.
Sixline Wrasse and Yellow Coris Wrasse will eat pods. Sixline is more aggressive.
Sorry I didn't see your previous post til just now for some reason. Is that frag okay now?
You can do an iodine dip to help the frag recover in that situation:
1 cup tankwater
1-2 drops lugol's iodine
3 mins

I dipped the frag in fresh water, but the water was kinda cold. I think that shocked the frag to death. It was barfing all over itself, and I was worried about it bothering my other frags, so I tossed it. It was a freebie, but I was dissapointed to lose it. In retrospect I should have been more patient on a number of levels:
(1) Let the water warm up more
(2) Let the frag try and recover longer

I have a different frag that came with a few dead heads. My turbo went over it, cleaned of the dead heads into clean stumps and now one of them is openeing again. Had I know they could be so resilient, I mught have left the other frag in a bit longer to see if it would make it. I really doubt it would have, it looked REALLY bad. Seemed like some of the under structire was showing through.

I'll get some iodine dip to have around in case something else comes up. Thanks again for the help weet!

The next time you have to do a FW dip, take around a cup of distilled or RO water and put it in a bag (I use ziploc) and float it in the tank for 15 mins. This will get the water to the same temp as your tank and will prevent the temp shock you described.
If polyps are so bad off that they have partially dissolved, I doubt you could save them.
However, if they are intact but just unhappy, it's worth your time to try to save them.
I usually start with an iodine dip.
If the situation is really severe or lugol's iodine has been ineffective, use Furan-2.
I try to always keep both on hand.

Which one of these is the right thing to get for dipping. Will it help pox?

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod...fm?pcatid=19744
http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod...cfm?pcatid=4832

Either one is fine, I personally use the KM version, but I don't think it matters.
Lugol's Iodine will not help with Zoa Pox, for that you need Furan-2.

How long is it okay to keep zoas out of water?

As far as how long zoa's/paly's can be out of water there was a discussion over at reefcentral about it a few days ago

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.p...hreadid=1618267

With my first four frags I did both a FW dip with TMPCC, and a saltwater dip with 1:10 peroxide, I think it was a bit too stressful as one frag is still recovering after 3 weeks, I also lost one frag to fungus. I didn't notice the fungus till after putting it in my tank. I tried a second dip last week but at that point it was too far gone. In the following pic the frag looks healthy but you can see the fungus on each stalk especially the lower left polyp.

if your getting one of two go with brightwells. He used to be one of Kents top chemist's back when Kent was good. Since he left Kents stuff is rather watered down.

So for the super noob, how do I adjust the PH of the RO water to match that of the tank? Understand how to float a baggie to get temp right but not sure on PH. Bought a frag (10-12 heads) for a new tank and they looked good for 4/5 days. They did take a tumble thanks to a snail, I saw it happen. Fall wasn't more than a few inches and they landed on their side but with heads against the glass. I put them in a different spot w/ putty this time but they haven't opened back up since. I'm trying to look at them closely for pests, etc. but haven't seen anything.

Thanks!

Just use something like Reef Buffer to raise PH, test PH before adding it.
It's a trial and error kind of thing.
I wouldn't give your frag a FW dip for what you've described though, only do it if you're sure there are pests.
I would try something like lugol's first, and maybe give the frag a couple of days to recover before worrying about it too much.

Thanks. I probably won't dip these unless I can see something on them for sure. I was just thinking about the next ones and making sure I do it right next time around. These were just floated in the bag with a little tank water added every 5 minutes and then put right in to the tank.

By the way just south of Chattanooga here, not quite neighbors but close enough

will any type of lugol's iodine work?

I think so.
I don't think the brand name matters as much as long as it's lugol's.
If anyone out there has different info on this, please post it.

Just ran across some helpful info on preventative Zoa/Paly dips here:
http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?...=180328&hl=

If I use Kent Concentrated Iodine Would the zoe recipe be the same as the lugols recipe?

That's the clear liquid, right?
If so, the recipe is different, and unfortunately I don't remember what it is.

yes it is clear.

Totally off the top of my head, if I had to do a dip using this I would do 1/2 teaspoon to a gallon of water for 3 mins or so.
It's been so long since I used this that I don't remember an exact recipe, so keep an eye on coral response as well, and if they start to slime up, take them out.

I will give that a try thanks.

i need some help..

i have a frag of zoas that are showing signs of zoa pox, and they are attached to zoas that arent showing signs yet, should i dip the whole frag?

also is the powdered form the same as the capsules? i cannot find the capsules anywhere, just 10 pack powder boxes...

none of these zoas are so bad that the polyps wont open so i am hoping i caught it in time...

also should i treat any zoa that has little white specks on it?

and do i do this dip everytime i introduce new zoas?

thanks!!
belle

You should dip the whole frag.
Powders are fine.
Harder to answer on treating any zoa w/little white specks, pics would help.
Don't do this every time you get new zoas.

Coral revive by two little fishes is a popular product that is used to dip new corals before qt. Just a heads up.

Yeah, I've heard good stuff about that.
Haven't used it, but I hope to get some eventually.

I have one frag that is infected with something,
I moved it to 2 inches from my 175 watt Phoenix and it helped some.
However the frag is still messed up,
it's been that way for months.
The frag was a 200 polyp colony,
I couldn't save much of it....
A fuzzy sponge was growing over it,
melting the colony now it still remain under the frag plug and I think as that brown crap..
I think the sponge liked my previous crappy light,
because it seems to not be a problem, this is the only frag where it's an issue.
It doesn't seem to bother/grown on any other of my zoas(i lost the colony months ago),
however I want to help this one because it's rare and I can't buy it anywhere.

I would try dipping it in some kind of iodine based dip for 3 days in a row.
You could do a lugol's dip as follows:
1 cup tankwater
2 drops lugol's iodine
3 mins

You could also try Seachem Reef Dip, Revive, Tropic Marin Pro Coral Cure, these are all good ones to try.

I'll buy one of the ones you listed,
I'm sorta nuts not having dip and like 90% of the corals I can have are zoas
Thanks weetabix.

Lol, yeah, you might wanna get some dip.
I just ordered some Revive tonight, guess I'll get to try it out for myself now.

I am having issues with my Zoa's and an infiltration of Nudi's. I 1st found 1 a few weeks ago not knowing about them, then they started multiplying. Now partial areas of colonies are closed.
I bought the Lugols Iodine last night so it should be here tomorrow.
The question I have is I have my Zoa's on Live rock already and have been in my tank now for over 10 months. Is it ok to do the fresh water dip technique with my Zoa's still attached to the LR? I am pretty sure this is the way to go but want to make sure. I have 1 LR with xenia and Zoa's attached. Is there anything I should look out for before doing this? thanks in advance.

Oh boy, you're gonna have your hands full dealing with this.
You will need to FW dip any rocks/pieces that have Zoas/Palys on them.
If you FW dip a rock that has Zoas and another coral on it, don't submerge the other coral in the FW, just hold the rock so that only the Zoas/Palys are under water.
Other corals will handle exposure to air much better than they will exposure to FW.
You will need to examine everything, all rocks, all Z&P frags very carefully for Nudi eggs.
See first post for info on how to recognize and remove Nudi Eggs.

nice thanks. I will begin this solution tomorrow. Should be interesting.

I have read where Flat Worm Exit is successful for treating the whole tank for nudis. What are your thoughts?

+1 on the above

I did 2 dips of the Lugol's Iodine spreading it out in 3 days. So far so good and my Zoa's are coming out again. I did probably lose about 15% of my population do to the nudibranch's. I may give them 1 more dip to be on the safe side in case I missed some more babies. By accident I dipped 2 small mushrooms that I did not see... Hopefully they recover.

Please tell me you did a Freshwater dip as well.
Lugol's alone will not kill nudis.
Freshwater will.
Did you look for and remove any eggs?

Yes I had 2 buckets.
1 with FW temp at 78 and PH 8.3
another with Saltwater from the tank with lugols

Oh, good deal then.

Any idea why these two polyps are half closed? There is some white stuff on the polyp, might be a fungus but it looks like scarring. The skirt is pulled in towards the mouth. My parameters are good and my other polyps are fine.

BTW Thanks for all the great info on here!

I'm not sure.
Is there anything nearby that could be stinging or irritating them, even something like a small aiptasia?
Is there anything picking at them?

No my tank is aiptasia free.. I thought maybe something stung them too but the only other corals that close are other Zoas and Florida Ricordea. I have re-dipped the frag and they still are half closed like in the picture. The stalks seem to be pest free so I'm at a loss here.

Hmm, not sure what to tell you other than to keep an eye on it.
There are things you can try just to see if they'll help, dip in Revive, dip in Lugol's, etc.
I wouldn't try a FW dip since they're Palys, which are more sensitive to FW.
They look like Palys, anyway.
Do keep an eye out for something nibbling on them like night time pests, Sexy Shrimp, or Pods.

I don't have any sexy shrimp but I do have some copepods/ampidops in the tank.. i thought they would just irritate the Paly or Zoa. I do believe these are Zoas by the way; they are just large. (Lunar Eclipse)

I'm fairly certain Lunar Eclipse are Palys.
I had some Lunar Eclipse for all of 5 days or so before they were eaten by Amphipods in my tank: http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?...=144465&hl=

Oh my mistake.. well maybe its the Amphipods bothering it. I have a 6 line wrasse who keeps the pods population under control but there are still some in there at night.

Thanks for your help!

Added pic: He wasn't on these Zoas but he was on another set. Might have been the cause. Neon green flat worm.. he was cool but had to go.

I have some issue with the claims of gloom and doom in some cases. For example, red bugs. How many, if any, accounts are they of red bugs harming any acros? Sure they infest them, but you have cited they "can decimate an acropora population and can spread very quickly to other acropora and ultimately whip out entire colonies." When and where. I have yet to find a case iof coral casualtiers, aside from anecdotal claims of "reduced polyp extension". All in all, I dont want red bugs in my tank, but I also dont think they are a big deal. And certainly not a "critical emergency"

Well, I can tell you that Red Bugs totally wiped out a small blue Acropra frag, but left my other two Acros alone. I'm talking about complete down to the skelton tissue recession, not just polyp retraction.