I have Red Bugs
Got the Interceptor and I'm trying to find a scale that measures 1/1000th of a gram. Know where I can find one? I can order one that measures 1/100th but it says I need to measure in milligrams.

So I figured it to be 0.15g that I will need to treat 60 gallons of water and I don't want to order a scale so it's going to be a guess. The pill weighs a little less then a gram so I'm going to pulverize it and divide it into six doses. Sound about right? Overdosing doesn't sound like it does much harm and some even do this on purpose and the only thing I'm really worried about is not putting enough in and still have the bugs.

Another problem I'm facing is the skimmer, it's a spray injection (Remora) so I can't turn off the bubbles but I need water pumping through it for the 6-8 hours of treatment. What would you suggest?

Just eyeball the Interceptor. Overdosing is not a big deal. Your skimmer should have an air intake somewhere that you can plug up with some scotch tape or something.

It's a different type of skimmer then that. The bubbles come from the pump shooting in water from a PVC pipe that is slightly above the water in the chamber, no air intake.

The only balances I've seen that measure to 1 mg are in my college chemistry labs. What is the info about how many mg (or grams) of milbemycin oxime (the active ingredient) are in each tablet?

I agree with wombat. Just Eyeball it ! I put an 1/8 th of a pill in my pico and I have never had pe like I do now. The acros are AMAZING and scares me that the polyps are going to get ripped off in the flow now. And it has been several months with one treatment and have not had to treat a second time. Even though most do.

There is 23mg of milbemycin oxime in the tablet and the rest is a beef flavor. I looked up scales online and the cheaper ones were around $30-$40 +shipping and they read 1/100th of a gram, the 1/1000th were $200 and up....not gonna happen.

Smitty, that's what I'm going to do this weekend. Not going to fool with measuring. I'll probably do three treatments 7 days apart.

Smitty was lucky....please do yourself and do all three treatments....that way you can rest assured that they are completely gone.....be aware that most shrimp and crabs will not survive the treatment....if you have any of either that you are really attached to, put them in a QT for the whole run of treatment....then they can go back in...they are not carriers, as redbugs live ONLY on acropora....


Oh, and BTW...a Pharmacist friend crushed and weighed mine....he had a milligram scale....

I suggest following this method of treating with interceptor. It worked for me when I had red bugs. The most important part was removing all the acroporas from the tank and keeping them in quarantine for at least five days. It takes a while to set up a quarantine tank that can support SPS. Water changes are important.
the method I used:
http://www.shadowramysreef.com/index.php?o...s-and-predators
some good pictures:
http://www.melevsreef.com/redbugs.html

In one method, it says the (23 mg Milbemycin oxime) tablets are ~1 gram and you want 25 mg of the entire tablet per 10 gallons of water. 25 mg of a 1 gram tablet is 1/40th of a tablet. In the melev's reef site, 1/5 of a pulverized tablet was used to treat a single colony. 1/5 is 200 mg, so you there is considerable leeway in what is acceptable.

I don't know if all that work is necessary--I just crushed up a pill and added it to my tank. Corals, stars, sponges, anemones, etc. are all doing fine and the acros are doing much better. Lots of people just do one treatment and it works fine. I also am skeptical about removing Acros from a tank to a treatment tank--really hard to do for some people who have it encrusting on rocks, and there is the possibility of missing some bugs. I also don't like the idea of tearing apart and moving corals for what is really a minor pest. But, as always, just my 2 cents...

I forgot to point out that I only had acropora frags in my tank. Anyway, I was too worried about other things (especially the pods like tanaids in the sand bed) not surviving to risk putting the Interceptor in my tank.

So I've removed all that I could catch and I hate for the others to possibly die but there's no way I can take out the acros, all of them are well encrusted to rock.

In just a few minutes I'm dropping in the first of three treatments. Next Sunday I will do it again and the Sunday after that will be the last one. I don't want these bugs coming back so three treatments it will be. I'll update later on the progress. Crossing my fingers and hopefully the Peppermint Shrimp, Emerald, and Anemone Crab make it. Screw the Electric Blue Hermit Crab that thing is a menace.

3.....2.....1

It's been four and a half hours and most of the bugs have died and a few are clinging on. The fuge still has pods running around, I can see 50 or so on the front glass. Holding off on the water change till around 6 in the morning.

The first treatment is over with and water has been changed. I haven't seen a single red bug, the emerald and anemone crab are still alive but I haven't seen the peppermint shrimp yet and I think it's a goner. It didn't seem to affect the pods that much, I still see the same amount crawling on the glass.

Hopefully everything that's made it this far lives through the next two treatments. What's everyones precautions when buying new frags?

The second dose got dumped in the tank today even though I haven't seen any bugs at all since the first one. Unfortunately the Tiger Pistol and Peppermint shrimp didn't make it past the first dosage and it's strange that the anemone crab seems completely unaffected, about 5 minutes after this second dose it came out and started filtering, has been for the past three hours. Must be the beef flavor.