long story short, i just started working as an aquarist for a small company, i service about 15 tanks a week, i'm new to reef keeping (mostly cold water experience), and one of my tanks has a MAJOR aiptasia issue. I"m talking thousands and thousands of them, its a 12 foot tank and its gorgeous but the aiptasia is out of control. i'm aware of berghia but i think i'd need hundreds of them which isn't cost effective. i've got one copperbanded butterfly and he probably does some work but obviously not enough. i know i need another butterfly or two. about 50 peppermint shrimp were put in the tank a month ago and very few are left, i have a feeling a fish had some nice snacks (ie. harlequin tusk). my stategy has been kalkwasser injections to individuals, very time consuming although it does seem to be working. i had read however that you shouldn't inject but rather leave the KW on its oral disc/tentacles. is this true? i have injected and it seems to be working but does this cause the aiptasia to asexually reproduce before it dies making the problem worse? i also worry about pumping too much KW into the system and raising the pH to much. granted it is a large tank and i've been monitoring pH but these 3 hour sessions of injecting seems like a lot of KW. any help or suggestions would be appreciated. thanks.
Aiptasia Control
- Thread starter kingofprussia
- Start date
thats seems like a big undertaking 
theres a product called joes juice that the aiptasia will readily accept and ingest. after they eat it they'll pretty much explode. since you have so many it might not be an efficient way of killing them but it works well and shoudln't affect the water, maybe if you use a gallon of it but i'd have no expirence using more than a squirt.
why did the pepermint shrimp die? i would think your odds are good that with that many at least a dozen should eat the anemones. what kind of lighting is on the tank and how long is it on for? You could cut down the lights for a while and an even better idea would be to cover the tank and leave them in the dark for a week or two (i know its a commercial tank but it would cost them less than paying you for the hand to hand combat with the things... i figure you might want the money though haha). Just my thoughts on the subject...
Neil.
theres a product called joes juice that the aiptasia will readily accept and ingest. after they eat it they'll pretty much explode. since you have so many it might not be an efficient way of killing them but it works well and shoudln't affect the water, maybe if you use a gallon of it but i'd have no expirence using more than a squirt.
why did the pepermint shrimp die? i would think your odds are good that with that many at least a dozen should eat the anemones. what kind of lighting is on the tank and how long is it on for? You could cut down the lights for a while and an even better idea would be to cover the tank and leave them in the dark for a week or two (i know its a commercial tank but it would cost them less than paying you for the hand to hand combat with the things... i figure you might want the money though haha). Just my thoughts on the subject...
Neil.
I also am having a little trouble with aptasia. I have lost 2 peppermint shrimp for unknown reasons. Is this Joe'e Juice that good? I have reef tank, will it affect anything in it? My 1st shrimp was taking care of my problem but just up and died. Is it true these guys need iodine? My LFS tells me to use this for my inverts.... :help:
I've heard iodine helps with molting but I never added it. I wont add anything that I dont test for... and I'm not about to buy an iodine test kit for my shrimp 
Joes juice is pretty good IMO, its reported to not affect anything in the tank... I havne't had problems but I mean... I wouldn't use a whole bottle at once. I usually wait till I have a problem then order some and use it, then do a water change, only becuase before I woudl wait months before doing something about my problem.
Now I just squirt it whenever I see one and I don't get an outbreak. I have 3 bottles on hand hopefully it takes awhile to use them!
Neil.
Joes juice is pretty good IMO, its reported to not affect anything in the tank... I havne't had problems but I mean... I wouldn't use a whole bottle at once. I usually wait till I have a problem then order some and use it, then do a water change, only becuase before I woudl wait months before doing something about my problem.Now I just squirt it whenever I see one and I don't get an outbreak. I have 3 bottles on hand
hopefully it takes awhile to use them!Neil.
Theres a certain type of Nudibranch that will ONLY eat aiptasia and will starve to death if there is no aiptasia to eat.