Montipora eating nudibranch experience

[markalot]

Howdy,

 

I added 5 Berghia nudibranches to my tank 3 weeks ago. Wait a sec, this is a Monti nudibranch thread, right? Well yes it is.

 

So last week, while searching for any evidence of the Berghia I see this single nudibranch on a fairly new (alarm bells) frag of an encrusting Monti. Being the calm, intelligent, and rational person I am I removed the coral, dipped it, destroyed the nudibranch, and then used epoxy and superglue to seal an area that was not incrusted and might be the perfect place for eggs. I believe might have been muttering incoherently during at least part of this process.

 

It took about an hour for me to start wondering if I killed one of my Berghia's.

 

Last night I'm doing the same thing, and once again a nudibranch is on this coral, similar location, but this time located where my superglue epoxy mish mash meets the coral. Fine, munch away, I'll look in the morning.

 

This morning this nudibranch is still near the coral, doing a circle around the outside edge (circular disc). The monti looks a little bleached, but I see no scarring or other evidence of a pest. I look for pictures of both nudibranches and of course this guy looks like a cross between a Monti eating and Berghia nudi.

 

Wouldn't this be a great time for a picture.

 

So for those of you unlucky enough to have experienced the monti pests, do they pretty much stick to the coral, and is the damage obvious? The pictures I've seen all show white skinless areas of damage, and since this guy was maybe 1/8 inch large I would think I could see the damage.

 

I'm not sure I can get a decent picture where this thing is located, but if I can I will post it.

[Grumblecakes]

I had them. I tired peroxide, iodine and manual removal. None of them did much long term. I did two potassium permanganate dips and i have not seen them since.

 

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2007-09/eb/ bee aware it will nuke part of your rock and kill pretty much any invert on it. though sps seem to take the dip very well.

[markalot]

Got a good picture and it IS a monti eating nudibranch. Lovely.

 

 

 

I have lots of bugs.

[Steensj2004]

Beautiful month though! Just got my tequila sunset. Hope you get it worked out!

[BlueThumb]

I'm resurrecting this post because I finally won the war against the infamous Montipora eating nudibranch. It took about a year, 6-7 months to eradicate and a couple of months to watch carefully for a few stragglers I missed. Here's how I did it:

 

1) My main weapon was a toothbrush (unused of course). I brushed off large nudibranches and their eggs where ever I could find them and reach them.

2) I also used an unfolded paperclip to scrape off small nudibranch infestations that were in unreachable places like cracks and crevices. It also worked well for damaging larger, more stubborn nudis that wouldn't let go from brushing, including their eggs.

3) I sprayed kalk paste on damaged parts of corals, around their base and underneath anything that I thought the little buggers could hide.

4) Greatly increased flow (which I planned to do anyway), which agitated them for sure. I'd say 1-3 were much more of a factor.

5) Rinse and repeat....steps 1-3...and keep watching for ones that you missed

 

 

I wish I was one of those people that photographs everything but I didn't. There are plenty of pictures of nudi infestations...and I had it just as bad as anyone. I didn't lose any Montis but certainly suffered some serious setbacks on some large colonies. For example, my ORA Spongodes and Purple Cap were a nudi favorites and went from a large colonies to a couple of dime size frags of each. But everything lived so I can't complain.

[markalot]

Thanks for the update BlueThumb. I had them come back in my 150 and I'm not sure if it was a new batch or some that had been living a while in one of my older tanks. Right now they don't seem too difficult to control, but I tend to simply throw out any pieces I find them on.