MAYDAY! MAYDAY! HELP ME ZOA EXPERTS!

[er1c_the_reefer]

problem:

 

the other week, i noticed a polyp of my armageddons was starting to look funny. kind of like half open, half closed. a day later it still hadn't opened up fully, so i decided to just remove it from the rock instead of risk spreading whatever disease it had. i tore the polyp off with a pair tweezers and it ripped apart. actually more like fell apart. i noticed that there were a few worms inside the polyp, so i iodine dipped it, hopefully killing off any other parasites.

 

i don't know if those worms had anything to do with the declining, but the problem has spread and infected another polyp. you can see it in the picture in the middle, the polyp looks a little lumpy and doesn't open all the way. i don't want to risk ripping up another polyp... armageddons are expensive! has anybody seen this before? there's a thread on RC about using furazone, anyone use that to treat it?

[djchristone]

er...were they bristle worms? o.O when my brain coral was dying, i noticed bristles fed on it... could explain the worms

[mvite]

Eric-

 

I haven't seen this----but had some "disintegration" problems with a recent shipment I received. I was told to dip with a solution of Lugol's and increase flow over the zoas. I didn't have worms---but this fixed my problems.

 

Sorry I can't help---I hope this gets cured soon--I know what you mean about the Armageddons.

[The Propagator]

I am aware of smal worms that bore inside leahers and the like but not zoanthids?

 

Do you have a pics of the worms ?

I am betting what you was more than likely the zoanthids skirt as it ripped apart or fell off from rotting away.

 

I would say the rest would be fine as that one polyp seemed to be seperated from the cluster prety well.

The only "worms" I know of that eat zoanthids are zoanthid eating nudibranchs and certain Eunice worm species.

 

Aside from fish, crabs tearing them off, sea spiders, and the above mentioned thats prety much it.

 

If the rest of the colony starts to turn white and developes a spider wed like deal over them then they were diseased when you bought them.

( provided they are new to you).

When they develpe this white crap on them they are rotting away and nothing you do will save them.

[kevxross]

If it were me I'd probably frag the rest of the healthy ones off that rock and probably into 2 separate frags.

[er1c_the_reefer]

i cut that polyp from the rest of the frag yesterday and cut it open in a little container to examine it more carefully. i didn't really see anything, except the zoa trying to expel some squiggle things out of its mouth, which i'm assuming is it's digestive tissue. it looks like what rics do when they're stressed. anyways, the only strange thing i noticed were these little clearish/whitish balls inside the polyp. hopefully they're not eggs or anything. i tried to get a picture but its too small for my macro lens to focus in on. hopefully it doesn't spread to another polyp, but if it does, i'll try to get another picture.

[AMichael]

Usually bristle worms (if that's what they were) only attack the sick and dying but if I were you, just to be safe, I'd remove the affected polyps from the rest of them to avoid the chance of infection.

[Xytrix01]

Also, be very careful cutting open zoas... They can be quite toxic, as one polyp contains enough nurotoxin to kill like five adult humans or somthing to that effect. Do a search on palytoxin.

 

Quote from http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.p...threadid=158663 (sad thread!!)

 

Palytoxin

The crude ethanol extracts of the Palythoa toxica proved to be so toxic that an accurate LD50 was difficult to determine. More recently, the toxicity has been determined to be 50-100 ng/kg i.p. in mice. The compound is an intense vasoconstrictor; in dogs, it causes death within 5 min at 60 ng/kg. By extrapolation, a toxic dose in a human would be about 4 micrograms. It is the most toxic organic substance known!

Shimizu [27] and Moore [28] published the chemical structure of palytoxin and it was prepared synthetically in 1989 [29,30]. Palytoxin is a fabulously interesting compound, with a bizarre structure and many extraordinary signs (Fig. 6). Palytoxin is a large, very complex molecule with lipophilic and hydrophilic areas. The palytoxin molecule has the longest continuous chain of carbon atoms known to exist in a natural product. In the molecule of palytoxin, C129H223N3O54, 115 of the 129 carbons are in a continuous chain.. There are 54 atoms of oxygen, but only 3 atoms of nitrogen. Another unusual structure of palytoxin is that it contains 64 stereogenic centers, which means that palytoxin can have 264 stereoisomers! Added to this, the double bonds can exhibit cis/***** isomerism, which means that palytoxin can have more than 1021 (one sextilion) stereoisomers! This staggering molecular complexity should indicate the difficult nature of designing a stereocontrolled synthetic strategy that will produce just the one correct (natural) stereocenter out of >1021 possible stereoisomers.

Palytoxin induces powerful membrane depolarization and ionic channeling [31,32]. Palytoxin is a potent hemolysin, histamine releaser, inhibitor of Na/K ATPase, and a cation ionophore [33]. It is also a non-TPA-type tumor promoter [34,35].

 

See also:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palytoxin

 

Typical symptoms of palytoxin poisoning are angina-like chest pains, asthma-like breathing difficulties, tachycardia, unstable blood pressure, hemolysis (destruction of red blood cells), and an electrocardiogram showing an exaggerated T wave. The onset of symptoms is rapid, and death usually follows just minutes after. Antidotes for the toxin include vasodilators, such as papverine and isosorbide nitrate, if injected into the heart immediately (Source: CBWInfo).

[er1c_the_reefer]

no offense, but been there, done that. good looking out though.

[Xytrix01]

good, good. none taken. I just wanted to post it as a general warning... You may know, but others might not, and think it's ok to go smashing up their zoas without taking any precautions. Better saffe than dead after all...

[The Propagator]

Yup they are probably eggs. I dont know if nudi's lay eggs inside the polyps though? All the eggs I have seen are always under the skirt on the stalks?

[masterbuilder]

Not wanting to hijack...but Xytrix01,

 

Not arguing with you at all and I am careful with zoas. Please show me one case of a human death from zoanthids. I would think that with all us bozo fraggers and 3rd world collectors someone would have been affected if it were as bad as it seems.

[The Propagator]

Its true MB.

Especialy true with palythoas.

It has to make direct contact with your blood stream, a membrane or your digestive system.

 

Only certain zoanthus carry playtoxins though. Just about all palythoas have them though.

 

 

And if thats not bad enough a toxic does strong enough to kill a human only has to be 4 MICROGRAMS.

Its not a joke, or anything to make light of what so ever.

So before any new reefers read this thread and happen upon the impending arguement your about to have.

 

Take it from some one who has been reefing for the better part of 15 years and SW fish keeping for over 20.

They are HIGHLY toxic and thier playtoxins WILL kill you where you stand in under 10 minutes.

 

A simple google search will give you all the information you care to read

about them in the form of 1000 or so links.

 

The point isnt to prove someone has actualy died from them.

The point is you can!

 

 

Countless people have become deathly ill when handeling certain zoanthus and palythoas while fragging. ( my self included ).

[kevxross]

Since this thread was brought back up, how did it go with the remaining polyps er1c?

[pet_doc]

myth busters:

 

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?...mp;hl=palytoxin

[The Propagator]

Bomm bada Bing !!

 

Good link !!!

[Sea_Of_Treachery]

at least you'll die from something you love doing

[er1c_the_reefer]

a friend of mine that collects zoas has them now. last i saw them, they were doing pretty bad. all but 2 polyps that seperated from the main polyps had died off. the 2 surviving look to be budding off heads though, so hopefully they're ok.

 

armageddons seem to pretty slow in growth... slower i think than ppe's.