Sick zoos what do I do?

[Salt4Us]

Here's a pic of our zoos, for some reason they've started to go bad. It was weird, the tops of them the flower part started to look like a pushed out flower and now they are brown and fungus looking, they are attached to the big rock now. Any suggestions of what I should do? Could my peppermint be destroying them? I have seen him on them at night. :x

 

[steve-s]

Your pepps could be damaging them but keep in mind anything that walks across them has the potential to cause tears in the flesh.

Typically most corals will recover from small nicks unless the water is somewhat less than par. Have you tested the water levels lately? Nitrates could be a bit high.

This affliction is caused from bacteria and can easily be removed. Syphning off the bacteria with a small airhose is best so not to spread it. Then dose the tank with a good marine vitamin high in vitamin C after a decent water change (25%).

You can read about it >>here<<

Cheers
Steve

 

[Salt4Us]

Thanks Steve! I'll try the vitamin C thing and I think I'll remove the peppermint and syphining. Nitrates aren't bad, they are at 2.5, even though I know 0 would be best.

thanks again!

 

[steve-s]

2.5ppm nitrate should not cause this problem really. Are there any other corals in the same vacinity?

You should still treat the tank but I would look for a different cause.

Cheers
Steve

 

[Salt4Us]

I really think it's the peppermint, he's constantly on them, I tried getting him, I'll try again tonight when I feed them, we used to have 2 peppermints and they killed our bubble tip anemone so I wouldn't be surprised, my husband is at the store now, he's gonna pick up some vitamin C, we do a water change weekly, maybe we will do more of one today. Thanks!

 

[reefrunner69]

What kind of water flow arte they in, and is your clown still hosting in the zoos? I do have an aiptasia that only comes out at nite, have you looked after the lights are out to see what might be going on with them? Be very carful with the zoos when dealing with them directly, they have a very powerful toxin.

 

[Salt4Us]

Nope, the clown that was hosting the zoos is the one that was eaten by the Giant cup that is back at the LFS. The other clown only hangs out under the Toadstool. Right next to these zoos are some other zoos that are larger but nothing is wrong with those. The ones below these are starting to act weird too but no brown stuff. Our question is will the vitamin C hurt the other corals or fish that are in the tank? We bought tablets and are going to crush them up, we'll siphon the gunk off them but the rock the way it's positioned is impossible to raise out of the water. Believe me when doing this we are wearing gloves! Not taking any chances.

 

[reefrunner69]

I have no idea what the proper dose of vitamin C would be for your tank, I probably would have looked for a vitamin supp specifically for the tank, that had a high Vitamin C concentration. Make sure when you are finished siphoning off the goo, that you add some bleach to the bucket with the siphoned goo and water before disposing of it. Also make sure the zoos have plenty of waterflow.

 

[steve-s]

Our question is will the vitamin C hurt the other corals or fish that are in the tank? We bought tablets and are going to crush them up, we'll siphon the gunk off them but the rock the way it's positioned is impossible to raise out of the water. Believe me when doing this we are wearing gloves! Not taking any chances.

Vitamin C will not hurt anything in the tank unless overdosed. It is actually a very good theraputic additive. The dosage would greatly depend on tank size. Generally I prefer to use Vita-Chem by Boyd Enterprises as there is less guesswork invloved. The vitamin should be used at normal strength for 14 continuous days.

What vitamin did you get? Human consumption or marine based?

Here is a great article by Albert Thiel that should help you.

Cheers
Steve

 

[Salt4Us]

Well we were going to do human, but he's at the LFS now seeing if he can find Vita-chem. Our LFS's around here are sparce, and are finding that a lot of things that are available in other states for some reason california doesn't allow. Like Calpera is not sold in California, and my husband had a heck of a time trying to find a syringe to use to Kalk an apitastia with. I'm hoping he finds something containing vitamin C, he's siphoned off the goop and we had the zoos in indirect water flow, the water was flowing towards the top to push the disolved organic stuff on top of the water to the preskimmer, we have since moved it and will have it blowing towards the zoos.

thank you both for the help!

 

[d9hp]

Well, dont put too much flow on the zoos, they wont like a blasting current.

 

[Salt4Us]

It has infected my Pipe Organ Coral, my most favorite coral besides the leather. I've been siphoning and have lost a lot of polyps on it due to this brown fungus, this morning it has gone across the tank and attacked a Xenia that was under the leather, which btw doesn't get very much light and I wasn't sure how long it would be able to survive under there, for some reason it never moved up to the light it just stayed in the shade of the leather. We have been dosing with Selcon which is the only thing we could find locally that had Vitamin C in it, it has 200 mg. I'm going to order some Kent Marine C today. Is there anything else we could be doing to make this not spread? It has affect two zoos which seem to be healing, no more fungus on them, no problem on the leather or the green polyps. I just don't want it to spread to anything else. Major water change? Should we do something different to the Pipe Organ? Siphoning it seems to be more damaging than helpful, if I lose the polyps what are the chance more will grow back, or will I eventually be stuck with a red skeleton with a tunicate and sponge left on it?



Look forward to anyones help thank you!

 

[steve-s]

Syphoning is still the best method of keeping it somewhat at bay. If you leave the bacteria alone it will only spread faster. Water changes will be a good idea to help keep things in line as well as ensuring fairly aggressive water flow. I hope the vitamin C is being dosed daily and all carbon/resin products have been removed?

What are your nitrate readings?

If polyps remain after the problem is erradicated, they will spread out and grow new colonies but the already done in ones will not regenerate.

Cheers
Steve

 

[reefrunner69]

Can we see another pic? How fast is it spreading? Is it consuming tissue, or just smothering it? Is it fungus like, or is it a jelly like goo?

 

[Salt4Us]

Well I just siphoned it off this morning about an hour ago, it hasn't come back, but the last couple days we have been siphoning it off twice a day. It is smothering it and the polyps won't open from it and basically is eating it away making the polyps stringy when siphoning When it comes bacck I'll get a picture of it and post it, I'm hoping I won't have to.

 

[reefrunner69]

Can you remove the rock that they are on? You may want to consider a dip. Also make sure they are in an area of good flow, once the stuff is siphoned off the flow will help keep the goo from settling back on the zoos. If this were my tank, I would seriously consider fragging any zoos that are salvagable as well as the xenia and the Pipe organ.

 

[Salt4Us]

The zoos are fine now, it's mainly the pipe organ and I can just get rid of that xenia and cut it off the rock. As far as the pipe organ yep I can take it out, it's a full piece, but how do I frag a pipe organ? I don't want to do anything to damage the tunicate either, it's an ugly color but it's a cool thing to watch.

 

[reefrunner69]

As far as the pipe organ yep I can take it out, it's a full piece, but how do I frag a pipe organ?

The skeleton of a pipe organ coral is very brittle and can be fragged by breaking it (although this will give little control over how much is actually fragged) or you could use a large pair of sheers cutting slowly and carefully.

 

[steve-s]

The zoos are fine now, it's mainly the pipe organ and I can just get rid of that xenia .

The primary problem with the pipe organ is the depth of the calcerous tubes. It is really void of any proper water flow and your efforts are being severly hampered by that.

If after fragging the pipe (as RR has suggested) I would syphon a small amount of tank water into a small pail and dose a small amount of Vitamin C and allow it to bathe there for about 15 min or so. Then place it back in the tank with reasonabley good water flow and away from any other coral.

The xenia should be placed as close to a power head as possible to prevent the bacteria from colonizing. It won't kill the Xenia, but it will give it a better chance at allowing the Vitamin C in the tank work.

How about those nitrate readings?

Steve
Cheers

 

[Salt4Us]

The nitrate is 2.5. The Xenia is basically gone, almost looks like something munched it, which I guess is possible, damsels don't eat Xenias do they? We put the damsel that was in our 5 in the 29 with the clown, besides him kicking up sand I never saw him bother the corals, it could be the peppermint picking at it which he'll be gone tonight anyway.

The Pipe has some flow, not real strong, actually the PH flows over it not directly on it. It also gets some gentle flow from the fuge outlet. The stuff doesn't seem to be coming over it as fast today, but I did something different, the Selcon I didn't add, I have been using it all week and today I haven't been, do you think it could have been the Selcon?

The other Xenia that is next to the one that got munched is doing fine, both were in really good flow and attached to the base rock, they moved there themselves after detaching from the main one we had which we moved up top.

I'm just hoping this all goes away.