Aiptasia!!!! ( tried it all)

[jdthomas24]

Ok--- i have used Ap-x, ap-control and boiling water and these things keep coming back in full force. I have about 20 of them in my tank now. So now im on to the peppermint shrimp gig. do they work? do they actually eat them. any other options for a reef tank? i hear mixed reviews on the shrimp.

[Reefman29]

The shrimp could work, they tend to eat the smaller ones. If possible you could remove the rock that they are on and let it dry out for about 3 days.

[jdthomas24]

of course the main one is on the bottom of the tank under all the others and some are glued together with cement puddy. woohoo!!!!

[jefathome]

peps should work. The more you get the better your chances. Ideally 1 per 5-10g.

[VacavilleFC3S]

1 peppermint shrimp should easily be able to handle them, it won't be overnight though

[snarkes]

Copperband Butterfly (Just kidding)

[cdeboard]

Yeah peppermints work well. You wont have any issues after a few days with peppermints.

[Saltwaternoob]

My peps didn't touch mine. Little kalk paste and everthing is gone

[Emmalemma]

My peppermints did a great job on aiptaisia! It's not overnight, but after about two weeks there aren't any that I can see.

[Jstdv8]

use pickling lime mixed with water into a paste and cover thier faces with it. leave it sit for 45 minutes and suck out the aiptasia and the paste. no more anemone

[Omie]

Peppernints did a good job in my tank... But be carfully if u have fishes that could it them, like the triger fish...

[Daimyo68]

I tried aptasiaX, and a few others, and some pep shrimp also. The pep's are hit and miss. I put 3 in one tank and they never touched the aiptasia, I ended up removing the rocks and using a small butane torch to burn the nems and surrounding area.

I purchased 3 more from another store for my other tank, and withing a few days, all aiptasia was gone.

Just make sure you are getting Peppermint Shrimp and not the almost identical looking Camelback Shrimp.

[rubytinker]

Now I'm worried! I just used Aiptasia-X yesterday with great hopes. Now I'm worried they will keep coming back. My tank is new & is too early in cycling (I think) to add shrimp. Aiptasia came on my live rock.

[JTL]

I know everyone has an opinion, but for me concentrated lemon juice injected with a syringe works every time. Might take a couple of applications but it works.

[VacavilleFC3S]

anybody who thinks peppermint shrimp and camel shrimp look ANYTHING alike other than color, should be shot.

[Daimyo68]

anybody who thinks peppermint shrimp and camel shrimp look ANYTHING alike other than color, should be shot.

Thank you for your contributing comment, but not everyone is the pro that you are, and when I posted in this thread it was only to inform the OP or anyone that may not have purchased Peppermint Shrimp before this.

http://saltaquarium.about.com/od/shrimpcare/p/prpeppermintshr.htm
http://saltaquarium.about.com/od/shrimpcare/p/prcamelbackshrimp.htm

http://fish.suite101.com/article.cfm/peppermint_shrimp_imposters

Back to the original post now...

[ta_billy]

Berghia nudibranchs worked for me. Just need three things:

1. great water quality
2. no berghia predators in the tank
3. lots and lots of patience

[Pufferpunk]

I've gotten rid of hundreds of them with kalk paste. Some come back & I kalk them again. I have 0 now.

[Crustman]

Copperband Butterfly fish love these anemones. It will need PE mysis or another quality food to keep it healthy.

[mike_cmu04]

Copperband butterfly's may be good at eating them but it is not guaranteed and these fish should only be kept by experts as they dont have a good survival rate

[captnslapy]

Pep shrimp did the job for me. I had a 55 loaded with it and added 5 shrimp and with in a few weeks everything was gone and nothing has returned in over a year.

[helmke]

Kalk paste works great, but you have to keep doing it as more appear. I've gone the peppermint route in my 55 gallon and that worked well for me. No more aiptasia - nada. However, the peppermints developed a taste for my frogspawn. :twitch:

Now I've got a few aiptasia in my smaller tank and I'm NOT going to put another peppermint there. I'll stick with the pickling lime route this time.

I am intrigued by the copperbanded butterfly option. I've heard some have great success with them and others nothing but trouble.

[vegita51]

Kalk paste and berghia nudibranch

[Tracey2]

Berghia nudibranchs worked for me. Just need three things:

1. great water quality
2. no berghia predators in the tank
3. lots and lots of patience

Who eats the berghia nudibranchs?

[jdthomas24]

hmm, well i think i will try 1 peppermint shrimp tomorrow. I treated again with ap-x tonight and found about 30 of them. Seems that more and more pop up now. they are very smart as some have moved to areas that is almost impossible to treat.

[srjordon]

Pickling lime the bigger ones and add some peppermint shrimp they will get the smaller ones and keep them in check

[Mmckibben]

I've used every single method for removing aptasia... well, maby not cold fusion, but every thing else. I had spent $600 just to get rid of them in my 36 gallon. The solution I found was a real hit or miss, but i got lucky and had success with peppermint shrimp. It took them 3 months, but they ate all my visible aptasia.

[jdthomas24]

im thinking maybe some nuclear waste---- but they will just move to an area where its not effecting them and bloom again. i found one tonight that was hiding-- it was the size of a 50 cent piece,, i was like DANG IT!!!

[reefraj]

Its hard to remove them completely. If you dont have something in place to check them they will come back. They can sed anywhere. In the sump also. You may even not be able to see them if it is in the back of rockwork. After few week it will start showing up.

Best is to pluck them (slimy) if they are big, use any chemicals on the groups what you can get to (apthesia x or joes juice or any ) and keep few peppermint shrimps. You will never see em.

I too went through this some time back. researched it at that time. Joes juice would kill em but in few days will start showing up. and onetime I had a forest - hundreds of them hiding in the back.

The first set of peppermints didnt touch them and was actually eating my corals instead. So I moved it to the sump amd got a new set from a different store. Now it is completely eradicated. (I hope) peppermints still in place.

Good luck !

[mcarroll]

Ok--- i have used Ap-x, ap-control and boiling water and these things keep coming back in full force. I have about 20 of them in my tank now. So now im on to the peppermint shrimp gig. do they work? do they actually eat them. any other options for a reef tank? i hear mixed reviews on the shrimp.

They do work, but the aiptasia aren't going to be their 1st choice for food. Once they've exhausted their 1st choice (food you're feeding the tank primarily) they'll start working on the aiptasia.

You can help things along if you have another tank that you can isolate some of your rock in. Toss one or a few peppermints in that isolation tank and cycle rock in and out of that tank until they've harvested every aiptasia. Should take at most a few days per rock - less once they get hungry.

I'm not sure what size tank you have, but potentially (http://www.wetwebmedia.com/hibffaqs.htm) a Klein's Butterfly (http://fishbase.org/Summary/SpeciesSummary.php?ID=5446) could be an answer to aiptasia too. I've heard positive results from several reefkeepers who were fighting the good fight on their own, but still losing the war. Klein's are reputed to eat (e.g.) Sarcophyton coral polyps in the wild, but I've heard (personally) of no reports of this fish eating or even noticing corals in captivity. However, it's not hard to imagine that in a small tank and/or under starvation conditions things might change considerably. :) Generally, I consider them no riskier than Peppermint shrimp.

peps should work. The more you get the better your chances. Ideally 1 per 5-10g.

I concur with this application rate. It's roughly the equivalent of a plague of shrimp - perfect to wipe out a population of pest anemones.

I'd also concur with others who've posted against the Copperband Butterfly. The Klein's is a very hearty fish and adapts to prepared foods readily - the Copperband is neither of these things.

Best of luck!

-Matt

[Mmckibben]

I'm not sure the 1 pep for ever 5-10 gallons is true, I have 2 peps in a 36 gallon. The aquarium started out with 70-100 aptasia, now i have 1 or 2.

[Jason F]

I have used:
1. Lysmata wurdemanni - good
2. Make strong calsium - damn good
3. Chaetodon kleinii - The BEST !

Chaetodon kleinii is really good, but when aiptasia is gone, then "Calvin Klein" start eat corals.

[juicesay]

Just get a syringe and load it up with pure kalkwasser.
That thick concentration will create a barrier between itself and the water.

Should be enough to supress their growth and kill everthing.
Make sure your powerheads are off, turn them back on in a a couple of hours.

That's how I did mine, nothing came back since.

Goodluck.

[mcarroll]

I'm not sure the 1 pep for ever 5-10 gallons is true, I have 2 peps in a 36 gallon. The aquarium started out with 70-100 aptasia, now i have 1 or 2.

Nobody's saying someone can't get lucky, but trust me - your experience isn't as common as everyone would like it to be. :-)

Think of our advice like this: 1 or 2 might do the job. 1 per 5 or 10 gallons will do the job.

If it works, long term one or two is certainly a more reasonable number to live with though - so it's well worth a try if one has any patience left for trying. More shrimp can always be added.

-Matt

[Mmckibben]

I'm not lucky at all! I spent $300 to get rid of my aptasia with no luck, so I decided to get new live rock ($120). About a month later millions popped up again, had to spend another $300. Finally i got the two peppermint shrimp... $30.

[Jstdv8]

mrs wages pickling lime 4 dollars for a lifetime supply, water free, time and aiptasia free tank, priceless

[hobbyfish]

Kalk paste or lime paste works every time. Mix with just a few drops of water into a paste. Use syringe without the needle to dose it right in their faces. They grab a glob of the paste then curl up and die. The super high pH kills them I guess. Works perfectly for me.

[jprince]

Try this method. I had a few in a tank once and used a 4"x4" flooring tile. Put the tile glazed side down on top of wherever they are, as close to them as possible completely blocking the light. (You can break the tile into smaller bits also!) They will move onto the underside of the tile in search of the light they need, and then you simply lift the tile out and dispose of them. I boiled the tile to dispatch mine. No chemicals, no needles, no wasted time hunting Aptasia etc. Try it out.

[nwinverts]

I tried most everything to rid my tank of Aptasia... I finally bought 10 berghia nudis for my 70 gallon long, It took a while, about 3 months. Now my tank is aptasia free and I was able to sell about 30 berghia to local reefers after they had done their job. I made a tidy profit in the process too. I’m firmly convinced that a biological cure is your best course of action.

[fastpcuser]

I always said berghias are the best, but try to breed them ... Aiptasia won't grow fast enough for you !!!

[nwinverts]

^ True story, that' why I sold them quikly after my aptasia were eradicated rather than have them simply starve. I'ts an easy sell when so many have the same problem.

[steamman]

Don't scrape them off if you do they will spread quickly. I think you are wise to say your tank may not be ready for shrimp yet. It shows you are more likely to make it in this hobby. How long is the tank established? The treatment liquid treatments others have mentioned will work. It may take repeated treatments. Turn your pumps off when you dose them.