[trodder]

My blue linkia star just died (seemed kind of sudden!) I stood him up against the glass of my tank for inspection and noticed that he had little white/clear bugs crawling all over him... Any ideas what it could be? Are they good/bad etc. I also now noticed them all over in the sandbed. I never noticed them before and I'm not sure how long they have been there. I do not have a microscope and they are extremely small (smaller than a deer tick) so I do not have any detail on description to give. Should I be in any need to panic? What should I do?????????? As many of you know I am still real new to the reef world so any help would be greatly appreciated!

 

[David Grigor]

Hard to say really without actually seeing but from what you describe especially if on the sandbed you may be seing isopods and/or copepods and are a good thing.........

 

[Todd]

No idea but see if you can get a picture? Any further description and I'll help try to research. Not sure what else I can do to help. Obviously anything you do to them risks damaging everything else. Could you introduce a bug eating fish(s)? Maybe freshwater dips and 100 percent water change in combination? I've read of some folks using drugs with some damage to corals, inverts. It may be necessary to get these fellas. Anything that would get them would no doubt cause other dieoff resulting in a new cycle.

Then again they might be ok, just taking advantage of something that was already dead? Does anything else in the tank seem to be attracting them?

I feel your panic but unfortunately I'm not sure how to help.

Todd

 

[trodder]

so far it does not seem that anything else is attracting them... but it is hard to tell. I will continue close observation for a while.

 

[kaba]

Hi trodder -- Sorry to hear about your star. Sounds like some type of 'pods (amphipods, copepods, etc.) were attempting to make a meal out of the dead star.

BTW, 'pods are a good thing.

 

[trung]

Like others have commented, the bugs are most likely copepods, isopods, and or baby amphipods. They are all desirable except for the blood-sucking types of isopods. Amphipods are the biggest of the 3 and they look like tiny shrimps. reefs.org library section has a hitchhiker's guide that desribes these things (look in the liverock or livesand sections).

Here's the link. http://www.reefs.org/hhfaq/index.html

 

[roon21]

you can always look at it this way at least there little and clear better than a 6 inch brisstle worm from hell

 

[trodder]

okay... now I'm getting concerned again. tonight a little while after all the lights went out all the little bugs decided to crawl all over my glass! They are everywhere! Primarily they are more concentrated on parts of the glass with a little bit of algae build up. Does anyone have any good pics of copepods, isopods, and amphipods? Again I do not have a microscope or anything so does anyone have any idea or any tricks on how to get a good look at these things to try and better describe or identify what these are?

 

[schmitty]

this is what a amphipod looks like on this link

http://www.odu.edu/sci/biology/jrh/whatis.htm

this is the link to isopods

http://www.nmnh.si.edu/iz/isopod/

this is the link to copods scroll down to page three

http://mailbox.univie.ac.at/erich.eder/UZK/literatur/CRUS2004_657-662.pdf

and by the way you describe them i think they are copods

josh