Flatworms found on closed receding GSP (ID?)

[sapling]

Kinda sucks this is my first post on a forum I lurk almost daily on.

 

but anyways, I noticed with my first 2 corals I have bought (a pulsing xenia & GSP) that one is doing great and the other looks like it's been receding. My xenia is growing and doing really nice so I wont talk about that one, but instead on my GSP.

 

I know that you have to give a coral some time to acclimate to the tank and leave it alone. and afaik sometimes with GSP it can look pretty bad before bouncing back. well I decided to look at it more closely and i saw this white flatworm move in some of the crevices.

 

I decided a freshwater dip would be best for about a minute, but besides the amphipods it didnt want to come off, I manually used my aquascaping tongs to reach into the coral and pull the flatworm out. well after putting the coral back into the tank, i must have agitated the flatworms, because i have pulled another two off the coral.

 

tank specs to best of my knowledge

 

size: 10g

2.5 months old

1.025 ppt salinity

0 ppm ammonia

0 ppm nitrite

0 ppm nitrate

~180 ppm kh

 

2 20" stingray LED on timer

chaeto refugium

AC 20

sponge filter

 

1 occ clown & TSB

3 electric blue hermits

1 trocus snail

 

~

 

the question is, can I have an ID on this flatworm? I searched online and this forum but cannot find anything that looks like it. And if anyone knows what it is can they tell me if they are beneficial or parasitic? could this be the reason my GSP is not doing well? Thanks ahead of time for the replies,

 

 

[Clown79]

That's not a flatworm.

 

That kinda looks like a cironalid isopod 

 

Did you do a coral dip, not just freshwater but something like coral rx ?

 

Check out melevs reef they have tons of critter Id 

[WV Reefer]

40 minutes ago, Clown79 said:

That's not a flatworm.

 

That kinda looks like a cironalid isopod 

 

Did you do a coral dip, not just freshwater but something like coral rx ?

 

Check out melevs reef they have tons of critter Id 

 

I agree..... it looks like it has eyes.  

[sapling]

I decided to take another look, since I still have the 3 I have pulled. I am not sure they can be those Isopods because of a few reasons. these are not segmented, lack legs, and were slow/easy to get with tongs once flushed from the crevices. those three things I noticed contradict the idea it could be that.

in the third picture, I flipped it over and I do not see legs. afaik all isopods have legs, hence my earlier assumption of a type of flatworm. also in the third pic I see bits of purple in the grey bits when I mangled it. could this be from its insides or i was just too rough when catching it?

No i did not use any coral dip when I introduced them into the system, I have heard that prophylactic coral dipping can be unnecessarily rough on corals when I first started looking into corals. these were not detected for the month i've had them. I do have Ick-X, general cure, and erythromycin on hand however for when i quarantine in my FW systems.

i apologize from the picture quality, the way im uploading them from my phone is wrecking the quality I will try to get another that shows what im saying more clearly if needed,

[WV Reefer]

8 minutes ago, sapling said:

I decided to take another look, since I still have the 3 I have pulled. I am not sure they can be those Isopods because of a few reasons. these are not segmented, lack legs, and were slow/easy to get with tongs once flushed from the crevices. those three things I noticed contradict the idea it could be that.

in the third picture, I flipped it over and I do not see legs. afaik all isopods have legs, hence my earlier assumption of a type of flatworm. also in the third pic I see bits of purple in the grey bits when I mangled it. could this be from its insides or i was just too rough when catching it?

No i did not use any coral dip when I introduced them into the system, I have heard that prophylactic coral dipping can be unnecessarily rough on corals when I first started looking into corals. these were not detected for the month i've had them. I do have Ick-X, general cure, and erythromycin on hand however for when i quarantine in my FW systems.

i apologize from the picture quality, the way im uploading them from my phone is wrecking the quality I will try to get another that shows what im saying more clearly if needed,

 

It kind of looks hard on top like a stomatella......... has eyes like an isopod...........flatworm bodies are blobby (that's a scientific term) and the thing in the picture looks very defined in its shape. 

[gone_PHiSHin]

eesh, those eyes...

 

not good

[sapling]

2 hours ago, WV Reefer said:

 

It kind of looks hard on top like a stomatella......... has eyes like an isopod...........flatworm bodies are blobby (that's a scientific term) and the thing in the picture looks very defined in its shape. 

I was thinking after I read this maybe my stomatella had babies, because I do have some in there, but these lack any antennae like the stomatella. the last two I have are still alive and I have tried to use a macro lens to capture a better image.

I just cant seem to find anything similar to these things on the ID sites I've seen, and from the macro shot not sure what to identify it as to search.
 

[seabass]

That last pic looks like a nudibranch.  It could very well be feeding on coral.

 

BTW, to Nano-Reef.com!

[Weetabix7]

2 hours ago, seabass said:

That last pic looks like a nudibranch.  It could very well be feeding on coral.

 

BTW, to Nano-Reef.com!

 

All of this ^^^. 

I can't give you a definitive ID on it, but it has all my spidey senses tingling and saying it's a bad guy.

I will say I don't believe it's a stomatella. 

You're gonna need some kind of reef dip to kill them, tho I know that's not what you want to hear. 

I haven't used it in a few years, but I think Revive Coral Cleaner might be slightly milder than CoralRx or Bayer but still kill pests. 

I personally use CoralRx now. 

[RayWhisperer]

No, it's a flatworm. No external gills. Checking nidipixle now to see if I can find a match.

Edit nudi pixel

 

[seabass]

 

Looks kind of similar to (these  nudibranchs) Dermatobranchus semistriatus or Dermatobranchus primus.

[RayWhisperer]

Yeah, similar. 

Im on page 29, and I've found a few that look superficially similar. Most have been unidentified and from the wrong location. I'm looking at the substrate they were photographed on, more than the worm, itself. Hopefully one can be found on GSP. I'd appreciate the help. There are like 125 pages. If someone wants to start from 125 and work down....

http://www.nudipixel.net/pictures/flatworms/28/

thats where I'm at. Start at the end, someone.

[seabass]

There are over 40,000 photos of nudibranchs and nearly 1500 photos of flatworms on that site.  It's pretty awesome, but I don't plan to sift through them all.  I'm not convinced the OP's pics are clear enough to rule out it being a nudibranch.

 

I'm looking at the substrate they were photographed on, more than the worm, itself.

I see what you are saying.

[RayWhisperer]

Lol! Watsamatter seabass, don't like a challenge?

[seabass]

I suppose I'm too lazy.  Good luck with that my "old" friend.

[Clown79]

It looks like a nudi to me not so much a flatworm 

[RayWhisperer]

12 minutes ago, seabass said:

There are over 40,000 photos of nudibranchs and nearly 1500 photos of flatworms on that site.  It's pretty awesome, but I don't plan to sift through them all.  I'm not convinced the OP's pics are clear enough to rule out it being a nudibranch.

 

I see what you are saying.

This is what I'm saying

http://www.nudipixel.net/photo/00016758/flatworms/

that one is similar. Not a good match, though. If you look at the substrate, it's on what looks to be a sponge. The location is right, indo, Malaysia, png, somewhere like that, not Kenya, or Spain.

[seabass]

You could be right.  That does look somewhat similar.  I like your methodology at finding an exact ID.

[Clown79]

Regardless what it is, I'd get rid of it.

 

I would also always pre dip corals.  Most good stores do and hobbiests as well.

 

The majority of us dip with no issues to the corals health. 

 

[RayWhisperer]

No pics of anything on GSP.  Oh well, I tried......

 

 

[seabass]

You gave it more than the old college effort.

 

That site is amazing.  Thanks for the link.

[RayWhisperer]

I stand corrected. It could be a nudibranch. I always looked for external gill ruffles to give a nudi ID. I see now, not all nudis have them. Makes no sense to me, but it's true. In fact, looking at some of the nudi id's, I'm going to agree, it probably is a nudi.

[gone_PHiSHin]

well i learned of that site through this thread, thanks.  that's a pretty impressive database.

 

but if it were my tank, i'd remove them.

 

i always use CoralRx

[sapling]

I just want to say thanks to everyone for helping so far, this response was alot more than I expected and I'm really appreciative,

So it's safe to assume from the update here these were what was afflicting/eating my GSP coral, and that I should order CoralRx to dip it in? should I try to use the coralRx immediately or wait a week since I already stressed the coral yesterday with the freshwater dip? I imagine there's a possibility of eggs since there was 3., but im not familiar with how fast nudibranchs reproduce. I am just wondering if the GSP can recover from this sort of thing.

[seabass]

GSP are a very hardy coral; I imagine it will come back from this.  Yes, you probably have more and eggs too.  Salifert Flatworm eXit is reported to work on some nudibranchs.  You might research that some and see if that's a possible treatment for your tank.