Red bugs...

[Viet-Tin]

I recently found red bugs on my small frags...I kept checking my water and nothing wrong, nothing eating them they all looked healthy except they kept rtn on me. Just today I saw a bunch of these very tiny yellowish bugs with a red dot on my acros...most of my acros died but I do have a small frag left which is swarming with these bugs. Where do I get intreceptor and how much do I use? I have a 100gal with a 55 sump/fuge if that helps any. How long do I treat for? Any help would be very much appreciated

[Viet-Tin]

Ok just found a few threads on the borads. guess I shouldve searched the threads before. Another question is should I treat my entire tank or just take the frags out and treat them only?

[hobogato]

if you can take all the acros out of your tank, treat them, and keep them in a quarantine tank for about two weeks, that would be the best way to do it. if you treat your entire tank, it will kill off your hermits and pods.

[Viet-Tin]

sounds good I only have like 2 or 3 left and theyre on small rocks. Would I still need to treat them with intreceptor or can I just do like a lugols dip or bath or something? Thanks

[Jeff]

iodine at the strenght you need to kill the bugs will pretty much kill your coral also.

[GaryP]

Check the retail forum. Richard had an outbreak of redbugs a while back and gave a link and info to Borneman's recommended treatment method with Lugol's.

Borneman did some tests and found that Interceptor did not give a 100% kill, which in my way of thinking, makes it less then useless considering the other losses that go along with Interceptor treatment.

[GaryP]

Paletta said in his talk that he thought the large water changes that go along with the Interceptor treatment method probably do more good then the actual treatment itself.

[hobogato]

well, im gonna have to disagree with ya gary. you know that up until i had the bugs for a while, i was inclined to agree, but after having them, treating, and seeing the almost immediate results, i would not hesitate to treat with interceptor again if i had to (God forbid). I did use a little more than double the strength that Borneman tested, so that may make it more effective.

[Viet-Tin]

Well Im going to try the lugol solution first and qt hopefully I can save the frags. Thanks for the help guys.

[technomex]

I recently did a Lugol's dip on a frag with red bugs. I put it in a beaker with 150 mls of tank water and about 8 drops of Lugol's...waited 15 minutes. The frag survived and the bugs died. The frag looked rather stressed, but is doing fine now.

[Viet-Tin]

Well my frags seems quite stressed already...theres some tissue lost on a couple. Think theres a possiblity of these guys not making it? Well if I dont do anything then theyre going to die anyways so might as well do my best to save them. Thanks for the help

[GaryP]

well, im gonna have to disagree with ya gary.

You're not disagreeing with me, just the gurus who know more about it then me. :) I'm just a parrot.

[JeffCo]

I also recommend interceptor. The medication helps, but so does the water changes. You will see very fast resuts.

[Viet-Tin]

When I qt the frags. Will a 10 with pc and a ph be enough? How long should I qt them for? Thanks

[hobogato]

everyone told me to qt for two weeks.

[Robert]

I purchased a frag a few weeks back. I always use Logo's Iodine dip to first see if the frags have bugs. If I see any bugs in the Lugos dip solution, I then dip them in a extra strenght dose of Interceptor. The frag I purchased had bout a dozen or so bugs in the solution. I diped the frag in a exta dose of Interceptor for bout 4 hours. The dip solution had about sixty bugs in the solution, all dead. I don't have any problems with the bugs anymore. Oh, I Always do a second dip of interceptor for all new members of my tank, except shirmp.

[Ross]

Robert i still wanna come over and see your tank, your just right down the road from me. Give me a call on my cell 830-534-1166!