AEFW!!! Now with Coral Pics

[CoryDude]

Remember the end of The Sixth Sense, when Bruce Willis realizes he's been dead all along? Well, I had one of those moments around midnight last night.

All the signs were there, and I never put it all together until last night.

- loss of color on all acros, especially in the last few months
- stunted growth rate
- little polyp extension
- tissue loss on some acros that resemble bite marks and trails
- some larger colonies have been losing tissue at the base

So of course I was up till 4am this morning pouring over RC threads, Melev's website, and our very own Hobogato's excellent thread from a few years back.

This morning I did a lugol's dip on a couple of smaller frags, and here's what I found. Here's a few of the bigger ones.

http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp100/cpryor74/TankShots/flatworm1.jpg

Here's a closer shot:

http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp100/cpryor74/TankShots/flatworm2.jpg

A lot of my acros may have been showing these signs for some time now (1 year +). It wasn't until a recent boud with red bugs, that the problems became very apparent.

I'll be setting up a qt this weekend and removing all acros from the main tank. It'll be equipped to handle the frags and colonies for 6-8 weeks. But, I'm undecided on the dip I want to use.

Betadine or levasole???

Ace, I know you used levasole. Did you have any reoccurances after you put everything back in the dt? I also know you had quit a few losses too during your qt process using this stuff.

Betadine is what I'm leaning towards right now. From the various posts I've read so far, it seems to have the fewest loses while still killing these nasty things.

Can anyone chime in on this and/or tell me their experiences with these pests?

[Europhyllia]

flatworms or nudis or what?

[rockmp]

AEFW = Acropora eating flat worms, and they are nasty. I am also in the same boat trying to deal with these. Dont use the Blue life USA flatworm product, I have tried it and does nothing. The one thing I am having some success with is using a turkey baster and washing them into the water column and fish are eating them. Also I picked up a corrase wrasse and he is going to town on them. Hope that helps. Good luck!

[CoryDude]

AEFW = Acropora eating flat worms, and they are nasty. I am also in the same boat trying to deal with these. Dont use the Blue life USA flatworm product, I have tried it and does nothing. The one thing I am having some success with is using a turkey baster and washing them into the water column and fish are eating them. Also I picked up a corrase wrasse and he is going to town on them. Hope that helps. Good luck!

So how long have you been dealing with this? I've toyed with the idea of just doing dips and using a turkey baster without setting up a separate qt, but I don't these to become permanent rituals for my tank.

[rockmp]

I noticed them about 2 months ago but really did not think anything of it till I started reading about it. I have dosed 3 times and nothing (if i do dose again i am getting the salfert product). This past weekend is when I got my wrasse. So hopefully I will see a good change in my tank. We will see.

[CoryDude]

Best of luck to you. Keep us updated.

I'm pretty sure I'm going the qt route. So far I'm thinking about using a spare 29g and fill it with water from the dt. I'll build a stand out of pvc and eggcrate, since I have that laying around. Then I'll follow Ace's dipping schedule from his thread and use betadine instead for the dip for the 1.5 month process.

I'm assuming I need to include all sps in this process. There's a stylo and a few monti's that are just starting to decline also. Any thoughts?

[hobogato]

fwiw, if i had an sps tank and discovered them, i would not do what i did last time. i would get a bunch of wrasses and train them to eat the AEFW. all in all, i lost close to 50% of my acros in the process.

[CoryDude]

Thanks for the input Ace. Looking at the logistics of this, I'm starting to rethink what I want to do. I'm afraid moving and dipping the frags, along with the different lighting and flow, might be a bit harsh and cause some losses.

Since I only have less than 20 frags/colonies, I may just take water from my weekly water changes and put them in 3 buckets. Then add betadine to the first bucket fo the actual dip and use the other 2 to rinse the corals. I could do this weekly for a period of a month and see how it goes. Luckily I only have a few corals that have actually grown over their plugs onto the rock. So it's pretty easy to remove and dip each acro every week.

[ErikH]

good luck bro. what a hobby.

[BIGBIRD123]

Cory, FWIW, I would dip every 5 days instead of once a week. Ace can chime in here about this too but every new article I have read, indicates they have a 5 day life cycle on the eggs. If you don't catch that cycle, the babies will be having babies, for an endless cycle of new eggs. I also would consider using the Tropic Marin along with the betadine. I dip EVERY coral, no matter who/where it comes from for 6 hrs. LMK if I can be of any help...

[CoryDude]

Thanks Steve. I've seen some that say TM works great and some that feel it doesn't work so well. I will most definetly go with a 5 day dip cycle as you recommended.

The qt tank is filled and almost ready. I just need to get the ph up a little and then all systems are go.

[Mr Cob]

Good luck. Any chance of pics during your process?

[CoryDude]

If I've learned one thing from all of y'all, is that it didn't happen without pics. Yeah, I've been documenting the damage on each coral and will be taking pics of the entire qt process, rock cooking, and new tank setup.

[BIGBIRD123]

I have a 30g tank and sump but no stand that you can borrow if you need. It is 24x24x12high.

[CoryDude]

Thanks Steve, but I've already got a 30 long that's filled and ready to go. Just fine tuning the ph and alk to match the main tank.

[CoryDude]

Getting ready to tear the tank down this weekend. Decided to cut every sps of it's base to help w/unwanted algaes hitchhiking into the new setup. Sad to see 2 years worth of growth being thrown away, but it needs to be done. Anyways, here's pics of some of the most heavily damaged sps:

Notice the bite marks. Also, the undersides of the branches are where these guys first got started munching.

http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp100/cpryor74/Tank%20Deconstruction/DSC_0038_edited-1.jpg

http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp100/cpryor74/Tank%20Deconstruction/DSC_0042_edited-1.jpg

http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp100/cpryor74/Tank%20Deconstruction/DSC_0071_edited-1.jpg

http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp100/cpryor74/Tank%20Deconstruction/DSC_0087_edited-1.jpg

They even went after a stylophora:
http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp100/cpryor74/Tank%20Deconstruction/DSC_0090_edited-1.jpg

http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp100/cpryor74/Tank%20Deconstruction/DSC_0123_edited-1.jpg

http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp100/cpryor74/Tank%20Deconstruction/DSC_0146_edited-1.jpg

Here's the dipping setup. Unfortunately, my cat has AEFW also:
http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp100/cpryor74/Tank%20Deconstruction/DSC_0003.jpg

Buckets galore!!!
http://i401.photobucket.com/albums/pp100/cpryor74/Tank%20Deconstruction/DSC_0245.jpg

[clone]

hey dude i battled with this for awhile. You can try dipping with revive coral cleaner. You would have to order it since I couldnt find it localy. After trying several other things this stuff really kicked butt. Although I had a twin spot hogg eatting them off my coral he couldnt get them all.

[BIGBIRD123]

I would also get Brightwell Tissue Restore for after...

[clone]

great idea steve that stuff works great

[ReefCube]

flat worms can really make or break you. most people throw in the towel I would throw away any sps that show signs of AEFW and remove the rest and dip them and put them in a sep tank with wrasses then redip them in about 2 weeks just in case you get some that hatched from eggs... then dip again after another week as for the other tank i would dry out all the rock and drain everything and leave it in the sun for a week or so. I used tropic marin pro coral cure. When you have a sps tank or just a few you must never forget to dip even if you feel the other persons tank is clean or so they say..