Celebration and bad news.. what to do?

[Electrobes]

well after two days of grueling mishaps, building, damaging, and a bunch of craziness.. I finally have my 45G tank hooked up with an overflow, a 29G refugium, a 250 watt halide with two 55watt PC 03 actinics. It all worked great and the tank is getting much better looking. I still have some finishing touches to do (the doors) but other than that its completely done. The bad news... I started looking at my pretty much barren live sand tank and mostly based rock with live sand refugium... in my main tank I have seen flatworms (and tried to get most of them out). Though not red planeria (they are clear with a semi orange center) they are supposedly toxic to fish if eaten, but do not cause damage to corals. I was going to get a single dwarf lion fish for my tank which now worries me for his safety. The next thing I saw was a red bristle worm in one of my rocks! Argh! I have like only two pieces of live rock in my main tank and I find all these!? My refugium I don't believe has anything, but most of the live rock I had in the main tank before construction is now located there. I obviously don't want anything like flatworms in my main tank, nor bristle worms.. but now sure if it is bad to have them in my refugium. What do I do?? All this after I set everything up.. sheesh

 

[reefobsessed]

I dont know a thing about flat worms but I thought that bristle's is low numbers were actually good for your tank as long as they dont get to big. Ive heard they keep opening up new holes in your rock thus better help with the bio load. Was I miss informed??

 

[Electrobes]

yeah but I am nervous about them getting too big in too big of numbers... Once I get my rock settled in with the corals... I don't want to worry about catching them...

 

[steve-s]

The one more common thing to remember about flatworms, is they will build to a certain population density and then crash on their own. This does not always happen but "can happen". Manual removal via syphoning and having extreme water movement throughout the tank will also help eliminate them. Since the tank is relatively new, you still have allot of latitude on what you can do.

One thing you may wish to look into is Saliferts flatworm exit. It does work but can be nastey stuff when used on a stocked tank. Since yours is primarily LR, sand and macro's, now would be the time to consider it if at all. If you do opt for this, ensure you have plenty of carbon and prepared SW to clean it out afterwards. Flatworm exit works best at double the dose (unstocked tanks only) but will discolor the water greatly. Be sure to syphon out all the dead ones you can find. The smell will go away with the many, many carbon changes.

Until (if) the bristleworms get quite large, they will not be a concern. There have been reports of ones well over 12" that have been found and rarely a casualty as far as corals or fish. The wee ones you find now are years away from a problem if ever. I will often find ones in my ¾ gal nano 2-3" in length.

Cheers
Steve