Documenting Bhergia for Aptasia — Almost done

[BearTheSquare]

I plan on documenting my experience with Bhergia now that I'm starting to see them again (added January 3rd 2020) in this thread. Please feel free to share experiences, give suggestions, and follow along with me...

 

I have been dealing with aptasia since starting my tank last March. I tried everything from glue, peppermint shrimp, to lemon juice with no results (if anything it only made it worse).

 

So I decided to add 4 bhergia nudibranchs in early November of last year when I thought it was getting out of hand. Those 4 were completely white and much smaller than a pencil tip to where I couldn't even see them in the container I brought them home from the LFS in. I acclimated them and placed them into the aquarium the way suggested online, but immediately they were blown off the rock. I watched 2 get eaten by the goby I had at the time, and never saw the other 2 again (I'm guessing about the same thing happened to them).

 

Anyways, after giving them until New Years with no sign of them being alive and assuming they had been eaten I ordered 6 medium-sized Bhergia from Salty Underground which arrived January 3rd. These were shipped very well, much larger (about half an inch), and definitely alive. I acclimated them the same way and they seemed to be fine. I saw them out and about at night, but never actually saw them touch an aptasia.

 

After a month and a half I am seeing 2 much larger Bhergia, and one smaller one (smaller/much larger than when I received them) every night. I know this is a good sign, but I still have not noticed any eating aptasia or any aptasia gone. Every story about these I have read online says one day they just didn't have aptasia anymore when they looked at their tank. 

 

So here are my questions:

1. I have never seen them hunt in a group/pair, should I move them to each other?

2. I have not seen any change in the tank, should I up the amount (they're pricey)?

3. Is this basically everyone's experience before they work their magic (I have no first hand experience)? 

 

And I know that this is a patience test, just disappointed currently after trying to start this process back in November then having to restart.

 

Blurry, but the day the new batch was added (January 3, 2020):

 

Current state of the tank (February 21, 2020):

 

 

[BearTheSquare]

As a side note, I’m really happy with everything about the tank currently aside from the aptasia. Just figured I would share the experience instead of hiding it until they’re gone. Hoping this helps me gauge how well they’re working (if they do) or helps someone down the road with a similar issue.

[Ratvan]

Are they bothering anything in the tank? The aiptasia to be clear.

[BearTheSquare]

Just now, Ratvan said:

Are they bothering anything in the tank? The aiptasia to be clear.

The playboy bunnies have it pretty rough right now, but aside from that it doesn’t seem like it. The largest bhergia I’ve seen has been on the rock with them every night, but I haven’t noticed a difference yet.

[Ratvan]

As a predator I would assume that they would target the weakest first? So maybe they're eating the smallest, the ones we can't see yet? 

 

Definitely interested in seeing what you find, might have to shuffle my Filefish out and a backup is always nice. 

 

When you tried the peppermint shrimp, did you have them singularly or multiples out of interest? 

[BearTheSquare]

@Ratvan

 

The smallest first is what I’m figuring, I know they’re eating something because they’re sitting a little over an inch now. 
 

I know the ones that you put in first are supposed to be the breeders, and essentially you aren’t supposed to see results until the colony gets big enough to take out all of the aptasia. So basically the 2nd or 3rd generation are supposed to wipe out the tank. 
 

When I tried peppermint shrimp I only introduced one. I read about introducing more, but I’m glad I didn’t because it went straight for my acans lol.

[SliceGolfer]

I recently added 3 Berghia in my nano. I have 12 Aiptasia at the moment and hoping to get these eradicated. The three I purchased were about 3/8” in size and have been in the tank for a week. Two crawled into the rocks, the third fell into an Aiptasia and was almost eaten. I tried to place them close but didn’t expect it to tumble and roll into the Aiptasia. I pulled it out and it crawled into the rock as well. I have not seen any reduction nor have I seen the Berghia. I think an over night expedition is in my future to hunt them out.

[BearTheSquare]

@SliceGolfer

 

I really wasn’t expecting them to be so sensitive/small. I had been debating on trying other options that might be quicker (Matted Filefish specifically), but I didn’t  want to give up on them too quickly and have wasted the time/money on them. Plus with other options there are risks of them eating coral/causing harm to the tank. Hopefully the 2-4 month eradication thing is true.
 

But if you’re trying to see them I normally start seeing them come out of their hiding spots about 20-30 minutes before lights are completely out. They’re so hard to spot that I normally look right at them without realizing they’re right in front of me lol. I’m going to try and get some pictures of them out and about on Sunday. 

[BearTheSquare]

Day 52 since new batch was added)

 

Stayed up tonight to both find some bhergia and throw off my sleep schedule. Still not seeing any results really, but they’re definitely eating. Three of them were on the zoa rock tonight, but I still haven’t seen them all hunting together. Hoping to see some improvements in the next few weeks. Going to grab some more pictures tomorrow.
 

Picture of a bhergia full of eggs:

[BearTheSquare]

Day 60)

 

Still no noticeable difference, but they’re definitely still alive and well. Decided that if I don’t see any difference in the next 30 days I’m going to have to go another route. I’ll post some pictures of the same spots and a new FTS later today.

[Steemax]

Seeing the amount of Aptasia you have in that pic, maybe they are multiplying faster than the bhergia's can even make a difference? May be why you aren't seeing any progress.

[legomaniac]

Just give it time.  When I put them in my tank they disappeared.  I couldn't even find them at night.  Time went on and I figured they had all died or been eaten.  Then suddenly, the aiptasia just started to vanish.  After another 2 or 3 weeks it was all gone.

[mcarroll]

On 2/21/2020 at 2:44 PM, BearTheSquare said:

Considering the expense and amount of time spent....it seems like you should be VERY interested in breeding aiptiasia and not just trying to clean up your tank.  You could get these results by simply doing (and spending) nothing.  🤷‍♂️

 

There are only 2-4 pieces of rock involved, so the problem LOOKS a lot worse than it is IMO....it's a tiny amount of surface area.

 

I'd be using Aiptasia X and have 80-90% of those pictured gone in one day. 

 

I'd have 70-90% of the remaining hiders gone on the second day as soon as they come out.

 

Optionally either leave that remaining 10% of 10% for the berghias....

 

Or that's when you rotate the rocks to expose the rest of the hiders that aren't even growing in the light and go back to work with Aiptasia X for another day or two.

 

(I've done this with 180 Gallon tanks that had Aiptasia way worse than this....just takes longer than 1-2 days since there's so much surface area.)

[mcarroll]

Just saying if getting rid of them was the only goal then that could be accomplished in a matter of a couple of days or so with a different method.

 

It sounded to me like the experiment was a secondary interest to actually getting rid of the aptasia.

 

Growing aptasia in this tank and just watching to see how the Berghia do (or "don't do") is certainly an interesting experiment in its own right if that is the real goal. 👍

 

(Hopefully all of your corals are in the clear from the anemones for the duration.)

[BearTheSquare]

Haven't updated this thread because I had seen no change and then the pandemic kept me away from it for awhile. Happy to finally be able to post some updates now that I’m back at my apartment. 
 

I still have not seen much, if any progress in the DT. However, the overflow is completely aptasia free now. I was very confused until yesterday night I shined a light back there and saw 50-60 baby bhergia looking for some food. I’m guessing the original group went back there and laid eggs right away. 
 

I just finished a 3 hour process of individually moving 30 of them into the Display. For the first time I’m feeling pretty optimistic and I’m hoping not to jinx everything. Now my only worry is that I’m moving again at the end of next month and I hope that they can either eradicate the tank by then or I can safely move them. 
 

I’ll post some pictures later today after a water change. 

[BearTheSquare]

On 3/6/2020 at 5:23 PM, mcarroll said:

Just saying if getting rid of them was the only goal then that could be accomplished in a matter of a couple of days or so with a different method.

I definitely see that, aptasia was something I dealt with in my first reef awhile back and other methods never worked for me then. After reading about bhergia and seeing stories of them eradicating a 120 gallon in 2 months and such I decided to take a chance on them. When I first added them there was not really an infestation (November), but I definitely did not want to risk chemical treatment spreading them more like I’ve had happen in the past. If the ones I had got in November were the same or closer to the ones I got in January I believe the problem would’ve been done before 2020 in all honesty. The babies I just pulled from the overflow were the same size (barely visible) as the ones I got first. 

[Tired]

Boy, you're gonna have lots of those to try to rehome after this. Hopefully their food supply lasts until after quarantine.

[BearTheSquare]

@Tired

 

That’s what I’m hoping for too. If not I might set up a little breeding tank for them and get some more live rock from where I got mine that caused the problem to keep them going. I read about 40 of them clearing a 120, I wasn’t expecting this many in a 10 lol.

[Tired]

I think when you hear those stories of things like "10 berghia cleared my tank of aiptasia", it's not that those ten, and those ten alone, ate everything. It's that those ten bred and produced more. No doubt anyone with a notable infestation in a 120gal is going to have a lot of berghia by the time the aiptasia are gone. 

 

It really is a shame berghia only eat aiptasia. Otherwise, they'd be such good niche pets. They breed readily in captivity, they're easy to keep (if you protect the filters against them), and they're neat. Though I guess you don't see them except at night.

[BearTheSquare]

@Tired

 

Yeah, I’m sure that’s what happens in those situations. I guess I was just expecting faster reproduction in a much smaller sized tank. 
 

They’re really similar to an ant farm in a lot of ways (colonizing and hunting together etc.). They’d probably be good pets for a night-shift call center or something because I’ve never seen them during the day. I will give them one plus as far as pets go, I have never felt like more of a dad to any pet than pulling the babies out of the overflow Lol. Wish they could just take care of themselves or at least not put themselves into situations like that.

[BearTheSquare]

In other news I managed to grab a few shots of the tank today. In all honesty I had not noticed the progress, but I guess being quarantined with the tank, all day every day, you don’t really notice things happening. 
 

February 3rd

 

Today (April 24th 2020)

February 21st

 

Today April 24th

 

[Ratvan]

That's quite a transformation in 2 months, tank looks awesome. I don't usually like zoas but your mat is very nice

[BearTheSquare]

...........And we’re down to about 10 aptasia left. Just snagged a picture of whatever you call a group of bhergia going to town on one of the last large ones. Already got some local people lined up to pass them onto, but don’t know if I should charge a small price or just do it for free. 
 

[BearTheSquare]

More are showing up to the party:

[Tired]

Nice! They're effective little things, aren't they? And arguably the easiest aiptasia treatment, when you have more than one anemone to get- just pop 'em in there and forget.