Live Rock hitchhikers (bad and good)

[ryanATW]

Im curious as to what types of hitchhikers all of you have found when you brought home new LR. Im intereted in hearing about the bad and the good. Preferably the bad, I want to know which ones are most common and how you got rid of them.

(Pictures would be great if you have them)

[cornetet]

In my experience the AIPTASIA is the most common hitchhiker that can cause problems.

pic = http://www.auburn.edu/~santosr/web%20photo/Aiptasia.jpg

WHY THEY ARE A PROBLEM:
1) they steal food from your other filter feeders
2) they can grow to be rather big and aggressive to things around it
3) they spread thruout the tank like weeds
4) if they get big enough and are next to a coral, they can sting your coral and start to kill it or keep it from growing


GETTING RID OF THEM (I found a very reputable website that taught me this):
1) go to the store and get a syringe with a fine needle
2) also go buy a bottle of concentrated lemon juice
3) fill the syringe with lemon juice - only about 1ml
4) turn off all water jets in your tank until it is still
5) slowly approach the Aiptasia with your needle - if it senses you are there it will shrink and hide
6) try and stab the Aiptasia right in the mouth and/or the meatiest part of the stock - YOU HAVE TO STAB QUICKLY AND ACCURATELY AS THE AIPTASIA WILL QUICKLY SHRINK AND HIDE
7) you stab and squirt in one QUICK motion
8) if you killed the aiptasia you'll see a brown cloud of liquid puff out
9) if you missed it you will have to wait 30 minutes for the thing to come out of hiding
10) the 1ml of lemon juice wont hurt your water quality - I've actually have killed off 6 aiptasia in one session = 1ml of lemon juice per attack = 6ml of lemon juice total

11) Call me weird...but this is all kind of a fun game. I like it when I do kill one...and I see the brown puff of liquid... I say, "GOT YOU!!! YOU LITTLE JERK!!"

[Dani]

Ha ha. That's funny!
Well, I've never gotten an aiptasia. (hoping that won't change)
So far, my hitchiking list includes:
2 porcelean crabs
4 snails
several small starfish (NOT good for a reef tank-will destroy coral...this is why I have a harlequin shrimp)
7-8 feather dusters

[MindyN]

The easiest way I found to get rid of aiptasia is to buy a peppermint shrimp. They will eat the aiptasia and rid you of the problem. I had an aiptasia on my LR and bought this tiny peppermint shrimp per my LFS suggestion. I thought it would be cool to watch this baby shrimp eat it. I put the peppermint shrimp in at night and in the morning the whole aiptasia was GONE!! I have never had this problem since. The LFS did warn me not to try and dismantle the aiptasia myself because each little piece that you break off of it can form a new aiptasia elsewhere in the tank. If you have an aiptasia I would try a peppermint first. Just from my experience!
Mindy

[ryanATW]

Its does sound kinda fun. Has anyone ever had a Mantis Shrimp or anything like that come in?

[DebsSisterFlo]

I have this "cute" gorilla crab... he ate my only bumblebee snail, the first night I got the snail... little bugger, I don't know how to get him out! Click on "see" my pics in my sig, he's on the bottom of the first page. I'd love to get some feather duster hitchhikers! I just got home with my live rock and I'm having a heckuva time placing it... Kevin is building a pvc rack right now...

[DebsSisterFlo]

check out this website for a great list with pics of common hitch hikers...
http://www.tampabaysaltwater.com/the...organisms.html

[cornetet]

Originally Posted by MindyN

The easiest way I found to get rid of aiptasia is to buy a peppermint shrimp. They will eat the aiptasia and rid you of the problem.

...and when there is no aiptasias to eat, the peppermint shrimp will steal fish food from your fish, then when that isnt enough it will start to eat your soft corals

[Little Luey]

I had 3 pepermint shrimp on my 90gal, yes they will eat your fish food but then all you have to do is account for them eating some. They never turned to my coral for food, luck maybe?
I saw them as an insurance policy to keep them and they were fun to watch.
I have now buble algie that came with a frag.

[Fly Guy]

Ive got those too. They have always kind of pissed me off getting in the way but my S.O. likes them. Anyway....check out this link. http://www.marinedepotlive.com/tree-...---polyps.html
They call them tree stick polyps and charge money for them. Anyway, I will now happily kill them with your blessings no matter how much she likes them. *evil laugh*

[jennmac415]

He, I have found a small starfish in my tank that i did not buy... it looks exactly like a very small sand sifting starfish, but seems to have about 7-8 legs instead of the common five(maybe it is deformed??)... is this one of the BAD starfish that will eat corals you are talking about? I DO have a sandsifting satrfish that is about 3-4 inches, this one is smaller than a nickel.

Thanks!

[whatevva]

I have found a small starfish in my tank that i did not buy

Jenni, That's sooooo funny! I found one today,too!!

[jennmac415]

Mine doesn't look like that, though... i think it might be one of those bad ones people talk about... Its legs and body are not spindly they are fat just like a sand sifter except the legs are sortof deformed...

[SeanT]

RDO has a pretty decent hitchhikers guide.
http://www.reefs.org/hhfaq/

[Tonsenagirl]

I ordered some live rock about 4 months ago and have been noticing more stuff in my tank lately also. So far I have 3 feather dusters, 1 clam and a bunch of small black snails with red tips.