aptaisia

[tcarola154]

I know there are a lot of posts about this... but Im kinda stuck.

I would like to find a natural way (not squirting something out of a baster at it) to eliminate aptaisia in my reef tank. I tried getting a peppermint shrimp... but i came home today to him cut in half and my hermit crabs feasting... before i assume that this was an isolated incident and go buy another shrimp... is there anything else i could use to get rid of aptaisia?

 

[Florida8]

Hot water thru the baster is pretty natural and chemical free.... you could try another pep. shrimp, but I have heard if they aptaisia is too big they wont mess with it.

When did you get your shrimp? How was he acclimated?

They are the only other Natural way I know.

 

[Brenden]

I used hot water on mine and is as natural as it gets. I think your shrimp was a isolated event though. I have close to 2 dozen shrimp and a few hundred crabs and have never had a issue with them. The crabs were just doing their job.

 

[Devilishturtles]

Are you sure what you saw the crabs eating was not just a molt, either? Check under the rocks, or behind them (shrimp will hide after molting, to protect themselves). But like the others said, I'd bet it was an isolated incident as well.

 

[Civicman86]

Hot water didnt cure mine. I had to use Joes Juice.

 

[Brenden]

Hot water didnt cure mine.

Did you hold your mouth right

 

[tcarola154]

unfortunately it definately wasnt a molt... the crabs were picking the meat out of the shell.

The aptaisia right now is at most 3-4 mm tall, its pretty small... but growing fast...

I did only get the shrimp two days ago... but i drip acclimated him as i do with all my inverts... and he seemed to be fine and I even saw him eating some of the aptaisia last night before i went to bed...

All my parameters are perfect and the only thing ive put in the tank recently was a calcium suppliment...

 

[kwan]

I used a strong dose of calcium.

 

[Macmommy]

My peppermint shrimp weren't interested. Hot water through a baster did nothing for mine either. The next "natural" way I tried: go to CVS and buy a latex free syringe w/needle (I'll have to look for exact size), draw lemon juice into the syringe, inject .5cc of lemon juice into the stalk of the aiptasia. Bye bye aiptasia. Worked great in my tank. Also, it helps to feed them first because they cannont contract as much when they have a piece of food.
Good luck!

 

[Brenden]

For people that said boiling water did not work....How close did you get when you squirted them? Mine melted to nothing instantly. I can not understand how it did not work?

 

[Devilishturtles]

Didn't work for me either. They just popped right back up the following days and weeks. Even direct hits with the near boiling water didn't work. Joes Juice worked in an instant.

I imagine my water could have not been hot enough (Which I don't think is possible, it was almost boiling!), or the aiptasia was just too quick to retract.

 

[Civicman86]

Didn't work for me either. They just popped right back up the following days and weeks. Even direct hits with the near boiling water didn't work. Joes Juice worked in an instant.

I imagine my water could have not been hot enough (Which I don't think is possible, it was almost boiling!), or the aiptasia was just too quick to retract.

Yup exactly what mine did. I was right on them when I squirted them. They were gone for the night and maybe the next day, but were back soon after.

 

[Brenden]

Rougly how much water did you squirt on them? Sounds like it was not enough to "heat" them up enough.

 

[Civicman86]

Rougly how much water did you squirt on them? Sounds like it was not enough to "heat" them up enough.

there was quite a bit in there. Had a big turkey baster and was about half full. either way, joes juics was cheap and resolved the problem in one try and didnt hurt anything else in the tank.

 

[fishrfreinds]

Im having this crisis too. My tank coming along and so r the pest. I got the needle and surenge too and tried that but to no sucsess. ive heard of using copper butterfly fish but Ive heard there hard to keep.
Can i buy one of these or would just be too hard to do.

 

[Devilishturtles]

Do NOT go with a copperband butterfly. There are much better options (like the ones discussed in this thread) than getting a fish. CB have a low survival rate, and grow quite large.