particularly resistant flatworms

[Lypto]

Hey everyone,

I treated my tank with flatworm exit after a nasty infestation of rust red flatworms, and after I treated with 3x the recommended dose (I've seen accounts suggesting that being overkill but it diddn't affect anything other than the worms. I had left a few worms visible to gauge their reaction and they, along with hundreds of others, floated off and died quickly. I put in the charcoal and began to wait until a week from now to dose those that hatched. Five  days later there's way more.

I dose again, 2x the amount, they don't budge. I up the dosage, to 12 drops (6x the recommended) , these things needed to go!

 

still no reaction, for up to an hour afterword they're still happily hanging out on the glass. I siphon out the visible ones i can find and turkey baste the rocks, and do a 50% water change. I looked at them under a microscope and they're almost certainly the same species. 

 

Have they built up so much resistance I can't kill them?

Any recommendations to help me route the flatworm scourge?

 

[Clown79]

Can you post a pic of the flatworms?

[Lypto]

As soon as I can find them again, they hid into the rocks and substrate once I started siphoning them.

They looked like these exactly:

[Humblefish]

Looks like flatworms. Most Halichoeres genus wrasses will eat them. I've also resorted to turning off the tank light, shining a flood lamp near the front of the glass, and siphoning them out with airline tubing as they congregate near the light.

[Tamberav]

I would add a Springer damsel....they are flatworm eating monsters and can fit in almost any size tank.

[Lypto]

I should clarify that it's a 2.5 gallon tank. 

 

Bit of an update, after a while they are beginning to string out, on inspection it seems they turned to mush after fleeing, but retaining their form and color, the few that avoided mushificatioin soon died. Maybe they had a mucus coat that protected them longer than the first ones.  There are still a few tiny ones alive, but the adults have all died. It took longer but it's still a very effective poison.. 

[Lypto]

I'm a bit concerned that I'm creating super flatworms

[Lypto]

It seems the next wave of flatworms is back, hopefully not super flatworms at this point. I thought I had nuked them, maybe it needs to be an every day occurrence for the next week or so.

[Lypto]

After a while, dosing flatworm exit and doing the whole carbon, water change, siphon deal every two days, the flatworms have adapted by hatching faster and dividing smaller with lighter coloration, they still respond to the flatworm exit, and  there seems to be a fair amount less. The next thing to do is to dose every day with water changes for the next week just to be sure, and hopefully eradicate this strain of worm.

[Christopher Marks]

Wow, keep us posted!

[Lypto]

They now replicate faster than tribbles, ☠️

I'm doubling the dose and scrubbing as much as I can reach, and dipping the corals. What a nasty, impressively adaptable species. 

From now on this tank is in super quarantine until I don't see any for 4 weeks, 2 of which will be the double dose with more water changes outside normal scheduling and longer times without carbon as to ensure all worms are affected. I'm very glad it's a 2.5 g otherwise this would be quite a hassle.

[Lypto]

I've beaten them back.

 I used two drops a day, every day, for 5 days. The build up of the flatworm exit leads to them not being able to lay eggs I think and I have a theory that it severely stunts their growth as well, as there's quite a few badly misshapen ones that die soon after hatching. ( I only have GSP and some mushrooms in the tank and it was a 15$ craigslist tank anyway so the risk isn't horrid), but that, and then a 100% water change and carbon has been a huge benefit. A few more days and I should be good to go. 

 

On a side note, all sorts of weird cool worms have appeared, including a peanut worm and some fairly large cool blue bristleworm lookalikes. This is in a year old tank without additions for a while so that's kinda cool.

Always dip, always quarantine folks.

 

[Lypto]

It's been two weeks and a bit, and I've not seen a flatworm since. I think I sterilized the ones that were left. I used enough flatworm exit to treat a 150g tank twice on a 2.5 gallon tank, so I'm glad the mutant horde is gone.

[Matteo]

On 6/26/2019 at 12:35 PM, Lypto said:

It's been two weeks and a bit, and I've not seen a flatworm since. I think I sterilized the ones that were left. I used enough flatworm exit to treat a 150g tank twice on a 2.5 gallon tank, so I'm glad the mutant horde is gone.

Sounds like you created some super worms! Glad you got it figured out.  Do you think the carbon filters out the affects of the poison? Thus making the dosing inadequate if the carbon is soaking it up? 

 

For example EMTs use carbon shakes for patients who ingested something not to be ingested. 

 

 

[Lypto]

The carbon 100% absorbs it, I had to not treat the tank with carbon for the majority of the time, as the flatworms had relatively low population and I could siphon out the ones that were visible, and the day after I used carbon the worms were back again. I think having sustained high levels of the flatworm exit was what prevented them from exploding again. Carbon is cool because on a microscopic size it has huge amounts of tiny, polarized spaces that are more attractive to the particles than the water, thus grabbing all the flatworm poison. It seems to bother Xenia but that may have been because there were small bits of carbon dust that they had stick to their mucus membranes. Weirdly enough use of the exit brought out all sorts of cool worms and cleanup crew members that had been hidden. Afterwards I think they multiplied and my tank has been much healthier.  My warm water adapted brittle star even came back out maybe twice as large. I think the flatworms had been stunting everything's growth. I do need to inoculate with plankton again however, my pods seemed to have died even with copious amounts of macro algae present.

[mcarroll]

That was one heck of a timeline!  300 gallons worth of eXit on a 2.5G!?!  I share your concerns about over-use.

 

On 5/4/2019 at 12:49 AM, Humblefish said:

Most Halichoeres genus wrasses will eat them. I've also resorted to turning off the tank light, shining a flood lamp near the front of the glass, and siphoning them out with airline tubing as they congregate near the light.

Were you able to try Humblefish's "night hunting" method? 

 

In combination with that method (that uses light) or separately, it seems like flatworms (as carnivores) should be susceptible to baiting with something meaty that can also be fastened down to a convenient location for siphoning into a filter sock.

 

One or more peppermint shrimp could be added too.

[Lypto]

They didn't seem interested in the light as much as they were in eating the growing tips of my GSP, they caked it and made a very convenient removal spot, especially at night, they loved to eat the growing tips of any coral I had in there.  I'm definitely on the lookout for a peppermint near me, but my local LFS was the one to give me the flatworms in the first place, and the peppermints I've seen were in a bad shape. The Flatworm Exit caused all of my Aptasia to explode so I have a huge amount of tiny ones to get rid of now. Which a peppermint should also help right? Lots of work left.

[mndfreeze]

https://www.liveaquaria.com/product/2198/?pcatid=2198

 

Blue Velvet Slug.  They nom on flatworms.

[seabass]

Just for reference, I've used Levamisole to successfully treat flatworms that became resistant to Flatworm eXit.

[mndfreeze]

You chemical guys are so boring. BUY THE PRETTY SLUG%$@^@!$

 

😄

 

Really, I wish the collectors out in the wild boosted the 'pest control' biodiversity options out there.  There are so many whack animals out there that eat/kill the pests we all deal with but most never get imported.  Hell even the more commonly heard of ones like berghia nudis are a bitch to find at times.  

 

I may be biased though as I love muh inverts.  

[seabass]

Many of these inverts have such a specialized diet that we can't keep them after they have consumed the pests.  That's why a fish can be a better natural choice, as they won't starve after the pests are gone.  Clubs have passed some of these inverts around, but even a decent sized club can run out of pests to provide these critters a full life span.

[Lypto]

Thanks for the suggestion @seabass!

I should set up a little bhergia breeding tank, maybe sell them to local LFS to help control their Aptasia. It'd be nice to have a larger supply and a local exporter as they often have huge stock of Aptasia.

I found a lovely guide here:

https://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/11/breeder

Seems similar to propagating jellyfish without as much hassle with brine shrimp and flow patterns.

Breeding those lovely blue nudi's seems to be a larger challenge and I'd rather not keep this strain of flatworms around. I think I prefer a chemical solution to flatworms as it reaches every single worm in the tank, and takes effect faster. A biological solution to Aptasia seems more fitting in conjunction with juice and removal as any chem that would affect them would also likely affect my corals.

[mndfreeze]

A berghia setup isn't that hard to do.  It's been done locally here in phoenix a few times.  They WILL eat the aiptasia faster than the nems can breed of course, but you just setup a separate tank for the aiptasia, put a decent light on it, and over feed like a mofo and they will take over every square inch of the tank.  Then just move them into the berghia tank every so often.  Most people use rocks but you can use any sort of tank safe medium the aiptasia will stick too.  Generally I'd avoid using rocks as the transfer method because you don't want a sneaky berghia to get back into your aiptasia breeding tank on accident when moving the rock back post-nomming.

 

As for the Velvet slug, no eradication method is perfect as you've seen with the flatworm exit.  Even when you think you've killed them all and don't see any for weeks, it only takes a few buried deep in your rock to make a resurgance months later.  A fish or invert bio contro method will also miss stuff no matter what and generally only works for as long as the predator stays in your tank.  Each post their own challenges and benefits.  The slug won't eat anything else, won't fight with other fish, doesn't increase your bioload, etc.  The fish on the other hand is definitely 'easier' as long as your tank can support it and it matches well with your other live stock.  

 

Possum wrasse will also eat flatworms.  Very peaceful fish also and small so works well in a nano.  I have one in my 32G and I love him.  Nothing like his 6 line bastard cousins.

[Lypto]

Glass/ acrylic plates  are good for that, I use them for jellyfish as I can just swap cultures or remove with a quick razor blade. Biological controls are fantastic as they replicate normal balancing found in nature. However, I think that with a steady level of exit in the tank, it would be possible to prevent eggs from developing as well as killing adults, and that they really could be totally eradicated, much like an antibiotic, a sufficient amount must be used to kill off all of it or you wind up with resistance.
I'd like to better understand the ways it affects the flatworms, as it seems to have both immediate and cumulative results. If I find another one I'll do a dosage test and film it under a microscope. Perhaps determine the LD50 for the flatworms. Maybe using a certain protein disrupter found only when they split or when eggs develop would be useful. Ethically I don't like testing how much kills a thing but these fit under the same category as mosquitoes and fleas for me so I mind less.

[Lypto]

Still no flatworms after extensive searching with a jewelers lens and some tweezers, now to beat the dreaded red slime.