Aiptasia woes

[brighteyes_cm]

Well i guess this is something every reefer has to deal with sooner or later. We knew we had some aptasia on the back of a piece of live rock at the base of our setup so we purchased a peppermint shrimp to remedy(we still see the aiptasia, but the pep has vanished) Then to add to the problem we brought home some grape caleurpa for the fuge and lo and behold it had some lovely little specimens in it. Now a week or 2 has passed and ive started to pull out the bigger ones (caleurpa and all) but there are small ones on the glass now too!

getting to the point... will pepermint shrimp be able to get to the aptasia in the caleurpa forest, or will i have to sift through the whole wad of it and pull em out myself?

how many peps for how long,do you reccomend to cure the problem, since we dont want to keep them in the fuge indefinately and would rather have them in the main tank.

i appreciate any suggestions

Colleen

[uurt]

I can't say how many shrimp you will need, but you could always just leave some in the fuge, and some in the main. As far as the one having "disappeared" prolly just hiding out while your tryin to find him!

Lee

[MontanaRocknReefer]

Hi Colleen! Your are speaking to a hobbyist who has had a long battle with aiptasia! I tried nudibranch but to no avail, bought a copperband butterfly that pretty much took care of the problem and then disappeared. The aiptasia came back in full force since it was obvious the copperband did not get them all!
I finally got to the point that I returned by puffer to the LFS so I could acquire some peppermint shrimp. I had another copperband butterfly in my system when I bought three peppermint shrimp for my 80 gallon reef tank. It took about three weeks before I noticed anything happening and slowly but surely the aiptasia were disappearing. A couple of time I noticed the peppermint attacking and eating the aiptasia! It wasn't a pretty sight in some respects but was a blessing in others!
Now I can't find any aiptasia and still have the three peppermint shrimp and the butterfly. I'm happy with the world and glad I went the natural route to rid my tanks of these pests! cath another member has been dealing with this problem as well and purchased a peppermint shrimp and believe she said hers were about gone! We wish you well and it will happen just give the shrimp time to adjust to your system!

[brighteyes_cm]

thnaks for the encouragement... Looks like Brandon will be picking up about 3 peps on his way home tonight... 1 for the fuge and 2 for the main tank.

one other question...
our fuge has lights on 24/7 should we adjust this for the poor pep whose new home this will be?

[uurt]

Colleen, you might want to consider putting the fuge on a reverse photoperiod. Leave the lights at night, off during the day.

HTH Lee

[MontanaRocknReefer]

I agree with uurt! Time your lights so the ones on the refuge come on when the main tank lights go out!

[Shack]

I had 3 pepps in my 30 and the took out the aiptasias except the very large ones. But they also ate my polyps and ganged up on the other shrimp.