crushed coral, flatworms, and a big decision... advice please :)

[Candi]

Hi everyone!

I'm hopeful someone can give me some advice. Besides my 24g aquapod which I couldn't be happier with and have 0 issues I also have a 50g reef.

It started out as a freshwater tank for my green spotted puffer, slowly increasing salinity each week until after over a year he was full marine... then the addition of a skimmer, LR, corals, tankmates.

As it started out as freshwater I started with crushed coral, which I still have... while I don't really mind the looks I know that it can trap all sorts of junk and lead to nitrate issues. So far they aren't bad (5 when I just checked) but I also have some flatworms that I inadvertantly added when I bought some LR from a reefer in MI before we moved. They aren't taking over the tank but I don't like them, not having much luck with sucking them out and my chromis & 6 line aren't interested.

So here is what I'm thinking about... should I do something drastic to get rid of the flatworms and should I swap out the CC for sand. I'm hesitant to use flatworm exit especially with my puffer in the tank.

How would you move forward, or would you (ie would you just leave it be).

I thought I could pull my fish into a rubbermaid with tank water/heater/flow... then either treat the tank with flatworm exit, pull all rocks to rubbermaids with more water, and work on getting the CC out before replacing it with sand and adding everything back... or is there another way I could treat the rocks (w/o hurting the attached corals/anemone) to get rid of the flatworms? Could I make a bucket of FWE and treat the rocks that way, then swish them out in a another bucket before finally replacing in the tan (after removing the CC and making sure there were no flatworms left, and adding sand)? I realize I'll be removing alot of bacteria when I pull the CC, I plan to use marineland's biospira and hopefully with that and my LR I won't cause any sort of mini cycle... I've used it to cycle tanks before w/o incidence.

I really want to have this worked out in my head before I attempt anything, my husband is very hands off with my tanks and I have a 3 yr old who will not be happy mommy is busy all day doing this so the quicker I can do it the better.

Thanks for any advice! Also, for future reference, what can I do to any LR or LR w/corals I get to ensure I don't introduce flatworms again?

Candi

 

[concept3]

i've personally had luck with a sixline wrasse going after flatworms- key thing though is keeping the wrasse hungry. If well fed, they won't touch the FW

I don't think FWE will harm fish, even scaleless ones. The harm comes from the toxims emitted from the FW, which you mentioned were not in plague proportions anyhows. I would probably go ahead and treat the tank, but as a precautionary measure, have at least half your volume of premixed and temp stabilized saltwater and lots o carbon in a filter bag ready. Any adverse reactions by your puffer can be reversed by doing that water change and carbon.

After treatment, usually 45 minutes, I would go ahead and start siphoning your CC real good to get both FW and detritus out; pretty much doing a water change. Throw the new water in, and the carbon, wait about a week or so and THEN proceed to change out your CC with sand. Doing it this way will prevent further stress to the boys.

 

[fishrdp]

Flatworm exit works

 

[sinkingbeach]

Candi I went through the same thing with flatworms, I ended up using the flatworm exit. If you follow the directions carefully, have plenty of carbon on hand and plenty of new water to you should be ok. These days I dip any new arrivals in flatworm exit before introducing it to my tank so once you get rid of them dip before adding to your tank it will save you alot of headache later on.

 

[Candi]

Thanks guys... I guess my big fear is that I just read on reefcentral about someone using FWE and supposedly doing everything correctly but having massive loss as they said they must have had far more flatworms hiding in the rocks then they guessed... although they mentioned snails/shrimp/bristleworms dying also... maybe they used way to much FWE?

If I wanted to "play it safe" & swap out the cc for sand at the same time could I just treat the rocks in a rubbermade or bucket with the same effectiveness? This is my most time consuming plan as it would involve taking everything out of the tank, drying it... cleaning it (it's acrylic and got some scratches inside when we moved so I've been wanting to get those buffed out anyways) and then rebuilding with sand, freshly treated LR, etc... I sense a long day/night whenever I do it no matter what I do LOL

Candi

 

[cmsurfr22]

http://www.melevsreef.com/flatworms.html

i am currently fighting flatworms myself. i am following melev's technique. i took a piece of rigid air tubing and use a lighter to soften the end of it so that i could put a 45 degree angle on the end. this gives you more options and makes it easier to syphone them out. i'm going on a syphoning binge for a couple of days and then i'm gonna hit it hard with flatworm exit. what i found is that i need to use 5 times the recommended dosage of FWE to kill the flatworms. i did this by puting the recommended dosage in with some worms that i had syphoned out and every half hour added another dosage until they all stopped moving. the FWE itself is not poisonous to any of your inhabitants it is the toxins that the FW release when they die that is very toxic. this is why it is very important to syphon as many out as possible. any rocks that you can pull out easily that don't have corals stuck to them i would pull out and give them a good shake in some freshwater. the freshwater makes the FW die very quickly. after a week i plan on treating my tank again just to be on the safe side. i recently purchased a couple six lines and a pair of mandarins. i'm hoping this will work. i will keep you posted and good luck

 

[Candi]

Thanks for the info and best of luck to you as well. I also added some chromis & a 6 line last week... so far I haven't seen them eating the fw (when I blew some off a rock a couple chromis ate one or two but then would just spit them out). I have a 6 line in my aquapod that I have seen eat fw's (I had a few in the aquapod, every now and then I will see one but it doesn't last long so it's no issue in there).