Controlling bristleworms & aptaisa
Controlling bristleworms & aiptasia
Lets discuss "bristleworms & aiptasia" for a moment,they are some diverse creatures and they do have a nitch in our home aquaria.
Aiptasia are considered to be a pest to most reef keepers , they can infest a tank in a very short time.
First off ( bristle worms ) their scavengers by nature and they do have a postive role to play in your reef ( if kept in check ).
And if your reef tank is not properly maintained both can infest your tank.
Bristle worms are nocturnal, rarely are they seen during the day with the lights on they only venture out at night to hunt for foods/waste, etc.
One rule of thumb to these little tank hell spawn' they can inflict a sharp sting to a persons fingers / hands so it's best always to wear protective gloves when handling live rock or the caught invader.
Also they can be in your sand bed but typically they are hiding among all those holes in your live rock.
How worms & aiptasia can infest your tank and ways to control their population.
1) Most hobbyist are so concerned for their loved fish they often OVERFEED the tank ( meaning they will dump flake/frozen shrimp/pellet foods etc.,
Into the tank and the occupants are often unable to consume all that food in less than a minute.
2) If you have several fish and desire to make sure they all get enough to eat try feeding in intervals every 30 minutes or so ( we all work ) and our time is limited as well.
Your fish forage for food all day long when your not watching, ( if their feeding/eating) their not going to starve.
3) High phosphate and nitrate,etc. all to often play hand in hand here if your over feeding , ( hence uneaten foods fall to the bottom where it begins to decay and you wonder why you have a bristleworm/aiptasia convention going on in your tank ? ).
4) And if you have a lot of fish they also make "crap", better known as debris, they gotta poo too.
General rule of thumb, in reef tanks are 1 inch of "fish" per 5 gallons of water.
5) Good tank cleaning crews such as some snails,blue/red crabs,some star fish, these little guys that don't offer much look at' but they are needed.( be sure to make sure their reef safe ) and maybe a 6 line wrasse
( well known to hunt for these small worms ).
6) If you wish to rid your self of all those stinging aiptasia, take some kalkwasser (2)table spoons, mix it in 1 cup of tank water ,use a "pipette" for squirting directly into the aiptasia's mouth, it will kill it. ( this is very economic and cheap way ) if you desire to buy something thats offered on the market, that's your choice.
Making sure the "kalkwasser is a thick consistency" it actually clogs them up and poisons them with a high dose of "feel good".
(If you have a small tank or have quite a few i would suggest in killing them off slowly over a few day period, you don't want to kalk them all in one night)
7) Bristleworms are some what a hit and miss to catch, you hunt them at night by laying your traps when the lights are off' these traps are readily offered to the hobbyist, and most likely on your LFS shelfs. Or you can be innovative and make your own.
8 ) Making water changes ( we all do it ) But most don't think of "stirring the sand bed a little."
Take a medium or light sized power head and hold it by hand in the tank, point it into the live rock and cracks and crevices of the tank (especially dead spots ) ie. meaning all tanks seem to have them, it's where water movement is most likely very low and therefore most likely to have more food wastes and debris accumulation.
The object here is to get that dirty stuff up into the water column and then proceed with the water change, you'd be surprised at how much you can remove in this way.
Your skimmer & filtration will get some of it as well.
( More so than it would if you didn't agitate the sand, give it a try. )
I tried all of your suggestions and it seems to be working quite well.
+Karma!!