Latest Shots of Acropora Killer - Help Me ID

Hey all, I posted about this before but without photos. A couple of months back, I noticed this white growth making a path through the flesh of my acropora lokani. I picked it out and the flesh grew back in that spot. I noticed it pop up again in a very hard-to reach part of this rather large lokani. Again, I picked it out. Well, today it popped up again in an easier spot to photograph.

I also noticed a few reddish brown "bugs" crawling on that acro, probably about the width of a very light pencil line, and maybe 10 times longer. You could see on the "tail" the shape was such that of a semi-circle with two little "tails" on the side. Maybe a very tiny flatworm. But I don't notice any flat-worm damage such that you would expect from an AEFW. The only damage I see is from this mysterious translucent white stuff.

If you open the full size imagine, you can barely make out the outlines of this translucent thing. After I tore it off, I took a photo of the white stuff in the tips of my tweezers, though not a very good one. You can also see what looks like the flatworm I'm talking about. Maybe an acoel?

 

What is the texture like? Flatworms on an acro, I'd be tempted to say AEFW, however some of the signs don't appear to be there. I'd dip the coral.

As for the white stuff, I'm still at a loss. What does its texture feel like? It almost looks like a sponge.

 

Looks like red planaria.

 

I really want some of that acro still, flatworms and mystery killer or not. Lol. I agree on the planularia though.

 

The white stuff could just be decaying flesh from the coral. It's is possible you have some coral warfare going on as well as pests.Take a look at this thread and see if the aefw look similar to the one you found earlier.

http://www.melevsreef.com/node/650

 

I don't think it's dead tissue, but I suppose it could be. The reason I don't think so is that when you peel it off, the damage stops advancing. It has a tubular shape kind of like a sponge, but when you touch it it's slimy and has no body. As soon as you pull it out of water, it basically collapses into nothing, which is why I had to take a photo with it still in the water.

Is a red planaria of any danger to acropora?

vinny, the offending flatworm doesn't really look like the AEFWs in the link you sent. If you look closely at the photo, it's kind of a rust color with two distinct "tails" on the end. Plus, the damage to the coral is not consistent with the oval bite marks from AEFW. It comes all at once when one of these things grows on the coral - usually over the course of a day or two. It advances fast. And then once I peel it off, it stops. It'll pop up randomly again at some point, but it's hard to see underneath this coral (where the is a big gap between the rock) and that's where stuff emanates. The flatworms are probably coincidental (hopefully, anyway).

I suppose it could be warring with another coral, but the tank has been established for a long time with this coral, and the problems all started before I made any changes to the tank.

 

Red planaria have forked tail and look about the same color as that top photo.
AEFW are rounded ends and more translucent.
I fought the RED for a year and can tell you the worst thing you can do is wait to do anything about it.
They can be relatively harmless for years but if a bunch die at once it can wipe out a tank. They killed my prized favorite fish a 8-9" Naso tang.(during a treatment) I watched him die over a period of 3 days and it was very hard to watch. It also came very very close to killing all my SPS. I thought for sure most were gone and it did kill some.
For what seems to be happening to you is they are just laying eggs on your coral and just their presence moving on your coral is killing small areas. I had that happen too and killed a few corals.

Here's how it went down for me:

I did a Flatworm exit treatment for the first time and it looked like they were gone. No ill effects at all. It's not the FWE that hurts your tank it's the toxic dead bodies of the flatworms.
They came back. They lay eggs so require a series of treatments. The good news is it is possible to do an in tank treatment where the AEFW you can't safely do that.
So I did a few treatments (can't remember exactly 4-5 maybe) They still came back.
I was already pushing a couple hundred bucks from the cost of FWE ($20 a box) plus salt and extra carbon. One bottle treats 300 gallons.
Well they still came back. Only this time I put it off waiting on the FWE to go on sale because I was planning to buy 8 bottles and do a whole bunch of treatments.
That was a huge mistake. It gave them time to keep multiplying. The worms you see means there are usually thousands more hiding in cracks all around the tank.
Put some of those worms in a white bowl with something that will kill them like coralX or maybe just some vinegar or something just to see them die.
You will see their bodies completely melt into a nasty orange toxic soup. Then imagine thousands of them making that soup.. That's what happens when you do an in tank treatment with a bad infestation.

If you do verify it's Red Planaria here's what I would do:
Move any prized/small SPS into a small temporary tank.. could just be a trash can for a day. If it's a small infestation this may not be necessary and the corals fish may not even notice.
Have in hand- one brine shrimp net. Once they start dying I sit there for hours scooping out all the dead bodies I can.
Have high capacity carbon ready in a reactor. As much as possible. You won't turn carbon on for 2-3 hours after a dose.
Have the biggest water change you can handle ready and new water ready for the next water change in case something does go bad.
Have filter socks. Mesh type for this for easy rinse. Keep all pumps running and I empty my filter socks about every fifteen minutes to get out dead bodies.
After 2-3 hours and you've scooped out as many bodies as you think you can.. time to do the water change and turn on carbon.


Most of this is mainly for the first treatment and maybe the second.
If the first treatment goes well do a second a week later. I had to wait a couple-3 weeks to allow my SPS to recover. Then I resumed treatment once a week for a couple weeks. By that time you probably won't see any dead worms at all. At that point I didn't bother with the carbon and water change unless it was just normal water change time. The important part here is to not let your guard down. Shift to doing a treatment every two weeks for at least a month. Then maybe another a month out just to see if any survived. I bought 8 bottles and did 6 treatments all together and I think I finally killed them all. You have to keep treating to make sure any unhatched eggs don't live to reproduce.
PM me if you want my phone to ask me anything.

Just wanted to mention again to keep all pumps running. I didn't do that first time so eggs could have been hiding anywhere in the system.

 

See if you can get a good picture of the bugs you mentioned.
If it is red bugs it's also treatable.

 

I was actually talking about the fw in this thread.
http://www.3reef.com/threads/flatworm-what-kind.159251/
Looking again I don't think it was an aefw and coralline correctly ided it.
I agree with av8 the worm in the above photo looks like a planaria.
The white thing in the pic above looks like a pineapple sponge.

 

vinny, I haven't seen any other flatworms like the one in the link. The one I found on that coral frag was removed before it was placed in my tank, and I haven't seen any others since. Also, this coral was having the problems I mentioned before that frag was ever introduced.

Av8, I don't currently have a carbon reactor. Do you have a recommendation for a relatively low cost reactor (and carbon to fill it with)?