Red Acro "Bugs" -- The Treatment

[dburr]

My shrimp is still alive, slow moving, but he just might make it.

[dburr]

I'm interested if anyone has done a second dose. How it went and how are the pod populations.

[Dustin]

I have done 8 treatments and still have a few pods left. Enough to repopulate the entire system.

If you read the discussion thread on reefs.org, you can read about the initial volunteers results.

[Acro]

Dustin, Are you just experimenting? Why 8 treatments?

[Dustin]

The dosage on my first treatment wasnt high enough and I still had bugs left over, so I treated again the next day. I just decided to stick to that schedule, 2 treatments in a row, for 4 weeks.

[Acro]

Ah gotcha

Hopefully I'll be dosing my tank in the next week here. I'll let everyone know how it goes.

There must be more out there that have treated their tanks by now?

[boogs]

Well i had red bugs and did the first treatment last night.

I've never had large numbers of bugs and only noticed a few on 2 or 3 colonies. I do frag and haven't been selling/trading since i discovered them so after much internal struggle decided it was worth the loss of small critter life in order to begin fragging and trading once again.

Let me preface this by saying, i have (had) HUGE numbers of critters and more than a few acro crabs etc all of whom i was concerned about with regards to treating my tank.

Within 2 hours of administering treatment i noticed a few dead pods floating around (much to my Anthias delight) and saw some acro crabs venturing out of their colonies. I reached in and they nearly let me touch them; they certainly were feeling some ill effects.

After 5 hours, there were several acro crab corpses on the sandbed and damn near no small critters to be seen. Now i know this is what happens when treating for RB's and after reading all about everyone's experiences i was expecting to see some micro-carnage but i wasn't prepared to see such a spartan ghost town at the sandbed level.

Apparently all the RB's are dead which is great but in all honesty, i don't know if i would have done the treatment if i had known how extensive the death toll of critters would be. I know the populations can come back (i'm counting on it) but i feel terrible for killing so many critters that had the misfortune of being in MY tank.

So...maybe this can be a note to some who are thinking about treating and just aren't sure: If you have a very active critter population and value your tank's overall health vs the effects on a few colonies of acros, you need to ask yourself just how important those acros are and if perhaps the RB's are simply part of the whole equation of life in our tanks.

"stepping off the soapbox"

Scott

[RedEyeReef]

Scott, I have been holding off for the same reason, I have a large critter population. I would be interested if you can update us in a few weeks to how your critter population is looking and if it is coming back.

Still on the fence.

[JB NY]

A few days after and then a week after the treatment, I still see many pods out at night. I also have a mandarin and a 6-line wrasse. Other than acro crabs, no other critter populations seemed to be heavily hit. I even saw my emerald crab the other night.

Possible you dosed too much of the medication?

[vmiller]

Joe, how is your mandarin doing? Starving the two I have is my major concern about this treatment.

Vin

[boogs]

"Possible you dosed too much of the medication?"

I did follow the instructions but it is possible i slightly overdosed based on actual water volume vs what i guessed i had (minus rock, sand etc). A friend of mine was involved in the initial testing phase and she warned me about critter loss. I tend to be a little more sensitive to that aspect of aquaria keeping than most.

I'm also stuck at work and wish i was at home doing large water changes but that will have to wait until tonight.

I am fortunate in having a local supplier of cultured pods and mysis shrimp and am counting on him to help me repopulate.

At what point are medication levels low enough to begin reintroduction?

Scott

[JB NY]

Originally posted by vmiller
Joe, how is your mandarin doing? Starving the two I have is my major concern about this treatment.

Vin

I don't see any change in behavior of my mandarin. He looks to be still pecking away and eating. At night I still can observe pods scurrying away when I shine a flashlight over my rockwork.

[G-money]

Glad to see that folks are getting some desired results.
I think it's great that you found this, Dustin - many of us never thought there would ever be a "cure" (if even only temporary).
My hat is off to you. Don't let the detractors "bug" you (hehe)...they seem to not realize the value of what you have found (to many of us) and the risks that were involved in your unprecedented testing phase. Conjectural criticism of your procedure is completely unwarranted.

I am redoing my tank at the end of the month with new live rock, so I think that would be a perfect time to treat my tank (before the switch-out). I hope my new uncured rock will be "clean", but after a month of curing without Acros in the curing tank, I don't expect a problem....thoughts? The main benefit I see is that the bug life on the new rock won't be impacted by the treatment...but the system itself should be clean.

[headhawg7]

I noticed again last night that the 2 colonies of Acro's that were infected with these bugs are now showing full polyp extension. It is amazing! I have never seen the polyps on one of these colonies(wild) and now they are showing flourecent green. It is unreal.

[boogs]

I do hope my post was read and understood as a counterpoint. I know RB's have been very detrimental to many reefer's systems and as such, this "cure" will no doubt result in a lot of happy SPS keepers. Dustin's work on this is noteworthy and he certainly deserves kudos for daring to use some of his own stock to do the initial testing.

Scott

[Dustin]

I thought I made it pretty clear that most, if not all of your good pods will die with the treatment. I also mentioned that anything you wanted to save should have been removed.

It does suck to see them all die, but they do bounce back very very quickly. These animals breed constantly. I finished the last of 8 treatments about 2 weeks ago and I am already seeing good numbers of amphipods again. I havnet been in to check for mysids at night, but I think I will this evening.

As to the question of when its safe to re-introduce them. . .
I would treat your tank at least two more times, you already wacked your pods, you might as well finish what you started. After that, your tank is ready for new pods and crabs quite quick. In my initial controlled tests, amphipods and peppermint shrimp that were added after the 6 hour treatment and the 25% water change with the addition of 2grams/gal of carbon, were perfectly fine.

[ReeferMac]

Originally posted by RedEyeReef
Scott, I have been holding off for the same reason, I have a large critter population. I would be interested if you can update us in a few weeks to how your critter population.

Yes, please do.
Thanks for sharing.

- Mac

[ReeferMac]

Originally posted by headhawg7
I noticed again last night that the 2 colonies of Acro's that were infected with these bugs are now showing full polyp extension. It is amazing! I have never seen the polyps on one of these colonies(wild) and now they are showing flourecent green. It is unreal.

You know it's funny (not that I'm singling Hawg out...), but I've noticed that the polyp extension on my infected acro's seems pretty normal at night. That's one big reason I haven't gone through with the procedure yet. During the day I get decent extension on most of my acro's, but admittedly, the infected one's are the one's that don't extend well (if at all)... but when I've viewed things at night, all seems normal. {shrug} I suppose my level of infection could be lower than others, hence the not as dramatic difference? Dunno.
What does cause me to pause for thought throughout all of this, is the fact that we (as hobbiests, and this time, unfortunately, scientists as well) actually know so very little about the organism. Personally I have to still question the desire to erradicate the animal, and I see a lot of similarites between the way this is going, and bristle worms not too long ago (but yeah, they killed my clams too... ), Anyways, not that I'm drawing a direct link here, I just mention it as a way of trying to level everyone off and start the thinking again.

- Mac

[Dustin]

If you treated your tank you would see a night and day difference in the corals that are bothered by the bugs. The increased polyp extension is noticeable before the first treatment is even done with. Corals that had lost color return to their original state within a matter of weeks. The differences are striking, its not something you have to look for.

I don't think that they kill any acro outright. There are some types that dont get them at all, some types that get them and look just fine, and some types that get them and hover on the edge of death forever.
You are correct, no one knows what they bugs do to coral. Do we really need to though? Its obvious that their effects are negative. We have created an artificial environment that encourages them to reach plague proportions. Our aquariums have a more diverse selection of prey for them, as well as what appears to be a complete lack of predators.

[ReeferMac]

Originally posted by Dustin
You are correct, no one knows what they bugs do to coral. Do we really need to though? Its obvious that their effects are negative.

Well, now, that's exactly what I'm talking about. No dis-respect to you Dustin, I realize you are, shall we say, a tad above the average aquarist? But I remember not too long ago reading endless posts about how "bristle worms killed my clams" (and educated and respected people knew what was going on)... when today we know they are just cleaning up a dead animal. I just wonder what tomorrow brings, that's all. I concur, that the circumstantial evidence seems overwhelming, but that doesn't mean it's concrete proof in my book.

- Mac

[Dustin]

People have had these things for years though, and they only do one thing, sit on acros and annoy them. Don't you think they have had enough time to prove they are possibly beneficial? What purpose could the possibly serve?

[ReeferMac]

Nah, you got me there.. Like I said, I concur, the evidence to their being detrimental is overwhelming.

- Mac

[boogs]

Update...

Got home from work and had a look at our 60 gallon cube LPS/softie tank on the main floor. The tank looked great and a few of the LPS (branching green hammer and an elegance) were notably more expanded than usual.

I went downstairs next to see the 180 and just like everyone else has said, all my acros looked good with good polyp extension. The tricolour's in particular were showing markedly more extension than had been previously. I did find 8 acro crabs that had shuffled off this mortal coil and were in various states of destruction, courtesy of the various fishes that were enjoying dinner.

I did find one live acro crab but he was not overly reactive to my prodding - hopefully he'll pull through. I also found some very small pods in the sump that were wizzing around like they normally do; no mysis shrimp were found, at least so far.

So...all the corals, clams and fishes look great as do the various feather dusters and a few of the larger bristleworms i could find.

I'll continue to search and let everyone know how the critters fair.

Scott

[headhawg7]

Like I mentioned before the polyps are night/day difference before/after the treatment. The bugs can not be beneficial because I noticed the bugs caused the polyps to retract thus causing the coral to grow slow and eat very little. W/o the bugs especially in the daytime the polyp extension is UNREAL. I would do the treatment again with no second thoughts.

[skeets]

Dustin,
I am in the process of moving over my 120g to a 180g. I am starting with all new LR and everything in my new tank, and will only be transfering over my SPS, two brittle stars, and 2 fish to the 180g. All the coral will be broken off the rock etc. I have had a aiptasia explosion and going to nip that in the butt. While I am at it I want to get rid of my red bugs. I will have my 120g and 180g set up side by side, and I can transfer my starfish over and my fish to the new tank. My question is, when measuring out your 25mg for 10gallons, did you ever try higher doses than that? Did if have any affect on SPS? Basically I can get my 120g void of everything but my SPS pieces, and I was thinking that I could just not worry about getting it measured out. I read this whole thread and heard you tell ppl to keep this to themselves lol, but I figure my circumstances is a little different. I wont be harming anything but the red bugs. I wanted to know how much of this you tested on SPS tho w/out seing any ill effects to the coral itself.
Thanks