Must kill Zoanthids.....

[JeremyGlen]

I have a problem and would like to know how to kill zoas. I have a patch of them that have begun shading my green monti and have actually started to grow onto the coral. I'm afraid they will grow over the entire thing and kill it.

Can I kill them like aptasia and inject something into them? Should I try and get some of those zoa eating nudibranchs? :lol (J/K)

I really would like to keep this coral and learn how to stop the spread of these zoas for further use. Has anyone ever had to do this before?

[Jeff]

what do the zoas look like and maybe you can frag and sell them.

[RNall]

That's what I was thinking. There is always someone that wants zoa's.....

[GaryP]

If nothing else, take them to FA. Felipe is always wanting zoas.

[JeremyGlen]

The only problem I have is they are on the same rock as my green monti that has taken a beating and not grown a whole lot since I got it. I just want to get rid of a few rows of these and keep them in check. I also have other protopalythoas that are killing my purple digi and the other sps I had on that rock. There were 4 polyps of the paly when I moved down here and now the rock is almost completely overrun with them. I'll post a pic of the two rocks when the light comes on.

[Enigma13]

I had some ugly palys overgrowing some more desirable zoos and needed to kill them. I injected them with a fairly strong kalk solution and it killed them. I injected the solution into the stem with a needle to prevent the solution from coming in contact with other corals.

[JeremyGlen]

I was thinking I could do something like that, but I am kinda cautious since we're talking killing many poylps. I guess if my tank can handle 3 fish and a shrimp dying in one night and no ammonia spike, it can handle this. Guess its time to try and get a needle from somewhere and get to killin.

[JeremyGlen]

Here's what I'm trying to prevent.

[Sherri]

On 2nd pic....these polyps will take over, trust me....They bleached out an awesome blue acro of mine...I can't get rid of them myself.

[JeremyGlen]

I would really like to get rid of them. I was thinking about maybe Joe's Juice. I figure its got to kill something if it can't kill aptasia.

[Enigma13]

I don't think Joe's Juice will do the trick. When I use it I don't even try to be careful with overspill and it kills the aiptasia and nothing else. As i mentioned above a heavy concentration of kalk should do the trick.

[JeremyGlen]

OK. I've been experimenting with liquid calcium, since it kills aptasia as well. When I inject it into the base or stem it seems to come right out the mouth and not stay inside the polyp.

I figured out how to get the smaller ones away from the monti, tweezers. I just peeled a section off of the rock that was closest to the sps.

[Sherri]

I've got clove polyps that are getting out of control...hmmmm maybe the tweezers would do the trick on them also!

[caferacermike]

I read somewhere that citic acid is super destructive to softies and aptasia. Basically squeeze the juice from a lemon or lime into a syringe and inject it. It is supposed to break down the enzymes and melt the piece from the inside out. If Joes doesn't work maybe that will. I was going to do it when 3 aptasia popped up in my tank but at the same time I bought a tank tear ddown and some Joes was included. Never got around to trying the lemon juice.

[JeremyGlen]

The only thing I can see possibly being a problem is the drop in pH from using an acid like that. How much do you think it would take to kill all of those? How bad would that amount screw up my water?

[NaCl_H2O]

I use a syringe and inject a VERY small amount of Muriatic (Hydrochloric) Acid into the base of each polyp. Muriatic Acid is VERY dangerous to handle, has a PH of 1.0 (One, Uno, yup - I said ONE). :blink (Read the MSDS sheet!)

I have a 700g system, so a little PH=1.0 doesn't have a dramtic impact, but this approach on a small tank could be disaterous!

However, I have to be very careful - the acid Oxidizes whatever it touches almost instantly and the "bubbles" will damage anything the bubbles flow through (above the site).

Use this method at your own risk - no warranties expressed or implied :)

I use this on Aptasia also - I can hear them scream - "I'm Melting ... " :lol

[JeremyGlen]

:lol I don't think I'm going to try that one....

[Jeff]

the first picture is very beautiful and you did rightby just peling them off.now grab some rubble and super glue the little frags onto them drop in the tank, and sell at your leisure.

[caferacermike]

The lemon juice acid method is not near as volatile as the muratic acid version. But bigger tanks call for bigger solutions.

[JeremyGlen]

I have a couple of racks that I can sell of those zoas in the first pic if your interested. I am going to have to try the lemon juice thing or the Kalk thing. I think the Kalk thing would be a bit better since my pH is a bit on the low side right now anyways. Kill two birds with one stone. Ha Ha, I made a pun.

[OrionN]

You can try to get your hand on a few Sundial snails and let them loose into your tank. These snails prey on Zoanthus and will slowly kill all your Zoas in your tank. for emergency, just kill them by hand. Becarefull handling these zoanthus because they can be very toxic to human and pets.

[klondike4001]

I'd take some of those blue ones if you get them off alive.....

[OrionN]

Frag the hard coral and sell the Zoanthus.

I used to have Zoas in my tank and it just absolutly overgrow all my hard coral and kill them.
I initially use a needle holder and just pull them one by one, then I got Sundial snails and dropped into the colony. I got a friend who own a LFS, and have him save Sundial snails for me when they come with his Zoas.
Keeping Zoanthus in SPS tank is asking for problem.

[JeremyGlen]

Well, I started out with one rock of these zoas and we all know what happened from there. I'm trying to get rid of all my zoas and mushrooms. They are getting annoying and stinging my hard corals.

I was looking into those sundial snails to take out the colonies. I hope I can find some. I think I'm going to be selling off some stuff here in the next few weeks to open my tank up and get more sps growing room.