Astrea starfish and flatworm infestation beginning...

Jamhvacr · 09/27/2011, 07:58 AM

Hi all! Thanx for any info u may have ahead of time

Problem started when i lost all my fish except one to ich and brooknella. I've been allowing my dt to settle out b4 adding more fish and also to ensure the culprits to my crash are gone.

Without the fish many things are thriving with no predators which is cool in a way BUT astrea starfish are taking over. Theres approximately one per every half inch u look on the live rock. Plus red planaria flatworms have also started to take over. I have 2 skunk cleaner shrimp and 2 fire shrimp. The pests arent effecting corals or damaging anything as of yet besides all my coraline has disappeared. Thats no exageration! All of it is gone since the arrival of the million starfish.

I'm looking for the ultimate predator for these lil pests. If at all possible i would like to add a predator that will not desimate my entire population of janitors and brittle stars... Thats gonna b the tough part IMO

I have 90g w/lps & sps... Please keep this in mind with your recommendations.

JaneG · 09/27/2011, 08:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jamhvacr

Hi all! Thanx for any info u may have ahead of time

Problem started when i lost all my fish except one to ich and brooknella. I've been allowing my dt to settle out b4 adding more fish and also to ensure the culprits to my crash are gone.

Without the fish many things are thriving with no predators which is cool in a way BUT astrea starfish are taking over. Theres approximately one per every half inch u look on the live rock. Plus red planaria flatworms have also started to take over. I have 2 skunk cleaner shrimp and 2 fire shrimp. The pests arent effecting corals or damaging anything as of yet besides all my coraline has disappeared. Thats no exageration! All of it is gone since the arrival of the million starfish.

I'm looking for the ultimate predator for these lil pests. If at all possible i would like to add a predator that will not desimate my entire population of janitors and brittle stars... Thats gonna b the tough part IMO

I have 90g w/lps & sps... Please keep this in mind with your recommendations.

Harlequin shrimp for the astraes (they won't eat brittles though) and a yellow coris wrasse for the flatworms might be good ideas...

Jamhvacr · 09/27/2011, 08:19 AM

Thanx JaneG! Good idea! I thought harlequins ate ALL starfish though. I'm considering them for sure. I've bin told that any Halichores wrasse will take care of the worms but may also kill the cleaners and janitors.. Idk...

nuff40 · 09/27/2011, 08:21 AM

Melanarus wrasse wiped out my flatworm problem in short order

Jamhvacr · 09/27/2011, 08:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nuff40

Melanarus wrasse wiped out my flatworm problem in short order

Did it desimate anything else? Snails trunks, hermit crabs, etc...?

greech · 09/27/2011, 09:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jamhvacr

Did it desimate anything else? Snails trunks, hermit crabs, etc...?

Mine did. Love my melenarus but if I ever rearrange my tank, I'm taking him out. This fish eats everything!

Jamhvacr · 09/27/2011, 09:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by greech

Mine did. Love my melenarus but if I ever rearrange my tank, I'm taking him out. This fish eats everything!

:-( stinks they are such voracious lil eaters but it is a really cool fish! My buddy jus got one to take care of his coral eating flatworms.

milspec · 09/27/2011, 09:48 AM

Did you ever try Blue Life Flatworm Control?
It will not hurt the tank at all and it will get rid of all the flat worms.
I use it all the time to treat and prevent them from getting into the systems.
I use it even when there are none that I can see.

Jamhvacr · 09/27/2011, 10:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by milspec

Did you ever try Blue Life Flatworm Control?
It will not hurt the tank at all and it will get rid of all the flat worms.
I use it all the time to treat and prevent them from getting into the systems.
I use it even when there are none that I can see.

No i havent. Thats a good idea too! Thanx! Will that kill more than just flatworms though? I would like stay away from meds n stick with a natural control for them if possible

greech · 09/27/2011, 11:28 AM

Be careful with full tank treatments though. If you have a large infestation, killing all the FWs at one time wouldn't be a good idea. Take a small siphon tube and suck out as many as you can before you add the chemicals.

milspec · 09/27/2011, 11:36 AM

The flat worms will shrivel up and disappear, It will not hurt any other thing in the tank. I have use this on a lot of tanks. If you have a blanket of flat worms, it is a good idea to try to suck most of them out before you dose. The flat worms are the toxic problem not the product. One small bottle will treat a 200 gallon tank two times. I dosed a 125 gallon tank with half a bottle once and other then no flat worms anymore the tank was fine. A day after the initial dose you should do a 25% water change because of all the dead flat worms not because of the product.

zigzag1 · 09/27/2011, 03:33 PM

The starfish are likely thriving as they have the opportunity to fill the role. They can act as a safety valve of sorts. If you had to choose between them and nuisance algae, which would you prefer? They may be a blessing in disguise. They will control their own population based upon the food available to them. JMTC & GL!

snorvich · 09/27/2011, 03:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jamhvacr

Thanx JaneG! Good idea! I thought harlequins ate ALL starfish though. I'm considering them for sure. I've bin told that any Halichores wrasse will take care of the worms but may also kill the cleaners and janitors.. Idk...

Asterinas can be cleared up with Harlequin Shrimp. But then you would have to feed them other starfish as that is all they would eat.

cassklar · 11/23/2011, 12:43 AM

How long does it take for a harlequin shrimp to eat the asternia stars I have hundreds and just recently purchased a shrimp I know he is fine because I see him walking around all the time it just that those stars have already eaten some of zoas and I don't know if I should manually take them out or just let the shrimp eat them

SDguy · 11/23/2011, 08:05 AM

If your flatworm problem is just beginning, I'd say it's the perfect time for a full tank chemical treatment. All the problems I've ever heard of when using such treatments was due to MASSIVE dieoff of thousands upon thousands of flatworms. If you only have a few, the treatement is super easy and worry free.

hythereef · 12/31/2011, 02:03 PM

I have had a problem for about two years with the retrogramma triloba flatworms. My aquarium is in an office and so can only be maintained at weekends. So this Christmas holiday and while my staff are away, has been a good time to prepare for flatworm extermination. When flatworms die they do emit a rather sickly, unpleasant odour. I have both Blue Life Flatworm Control and a pack of Flatworm Exit. I have not yet decided which to use.
The tank is 500L net of rock and is a general mixed reef. Like many people on this forum I have siphoned these creatures out for months but they persist!
So this week I have siphoned the flatworms out each day for four days and I expect that the population is now fairly low. For those who are not aware, it is important to remove as many flatworms as possible because when they die they exude a toxin which will be very harmfully to to the other inhabitants of the aquarium.
I have two 100L barrels of fresh water ready to go. I use Red Sea Pro salt. This 200L of water will enable me to do a very large water change as soon as the treatment is complete. The protein skimmer is cleaned and ready to turn on as soon as worm-death has occurred. In addition to this I have a Tetratec600 canister filter packed with carbon and this will run for a day or so after the water change, hopefully it will help to remove residual toxin from the water.
A number of you will have experience with this and I ask if you see any problems with my plan?

hythereef · 01/05/2012, 04:25 PM

Well folks FW Extermination proceeded to plan last Sunday. Judging by the fact that there are only four or five creeping about on the glass I would say it was 99.5% wipe-out. I used Flatworm Exit at approx 120% dose. I ran the carbon until today (4 days) no fish / inverts were harmed or stressed.
Question - how soon before I add a second dose to remove stragglers and hatchlings? I think this time I might use Blue Vet in case the stragglers were to resistant to FWExit

aleonn · 01/05/2012, 04:56 PM

My yellow coris wrasse (halichoeres chrysus) exterminated my flatworm population within 3-4 weeks, and got fat in the process. Mine doesn't pick on CUC either. As for asterina starfish, I manually removed hundreds of them for a few months. If I had known about the harlequin shrimp route, I'd have done it long ago

.

aleonn · 01/05/2012, 04:56 PM

duplicate

slakker187 · 01/06/2012, 01:25 AM

harlequin shrimp are expensive and dont work very well on asterina stars they prefer large starfish. the ones that i bought were having problems picking them off of the rock. ($120 wasted on four) i tried on my 240g and they didnt do anything. the only thing that worked for me was getting some tweezers coming in the morning when they are all out and snatch them out. also they are voracious coraline algae eaters so the sooner you start your crusade the better. good luck.

sahin · 01/06/2012, 06:41 AM

When my tank got flatworms years ago, I got a sixline whcih completely finished them off over a few weeks. No chemicals needed. As for the Asterina stars they come and go with nutrient load (which = micro algae and algae film to them to feed on). They disappeared as soon as my tank entered a low nutrient level.

hythereef · 01/07/2012, 07:43 AM

My six line wrasse does not eat flatworms

milhous3er · 01/07/2012, 08:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hythereef

My six line wrasse does not eat flatworms

Neither does my Melanarus, Ornate or Yellow coris.

OP, I would suggest using FWE about a week after your first dosage. You're seeing 4-5, but in essance you probably have 400-500 still in the crevices of your LR.

Be prepared to have that carbon running again.

09/27/2011, 07:58 AM	#1
Jamhvacr Registered Member Join Date: Jun 2011 Location: Dover, PA Posts: 22	Astrea starfish and flatworm infestation beginning... Hi all! Thanx for any info u may have ahead of time Problem started when i lost all my fish except one to ich and brooknella. I've been allowing my dt to settle out b4 adding more fish and also to ensure the culprits to my crash are gone. Without the fish many things are thriving with no predators which is cool in a way BUT astrea starfish are taking over. Theres approximately one per every half inch u look on the live rock. Plus red planaria flatworms have also started to take over. I have 2 skunk cleaner shrimp and 2 fire shrimp. The pests arent effecting corals or damaging anything as of yet besides all my coraline has disappeared. Thats no exageration! All of it is gone since the arrival of the million starfish. I'm looking for the ultimate predator for these lil pests. If at all possible i would like to add a predator that will not desimate my entire population of janitors and brittle stars... Thats gonna b the tough part IMO I have 90g w/lps & sps... Please keep this in mind with your recommendations.

09/27/2011, 09:48 AM	#8
milspec Registered Member Join Date: Sep 2011 Location: SC Posts: 236	Did you ever try Blue Life Flatworm Control? It will not hurt the tank at all and it will get rid of all the flat worms. I use it all the time to treat and prevent them from getting into the systems. I use it even when there are none that I can see. Last edited by milspec; 09/27/2011 at 10:01 AM.

09/27/2011, 11:28 AM	#10
greech Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2009 Location: Tallahassee, FL Posts: 3,133	Be careful with full tank treatments though. If you have a large infestation, killing all the FWs at one time wouldn't be a good idea. Take a small siphon tube and suck out as many as you can before you add the chemicals. __________________ ~Graham Current Tank Info: Tank: 40 breeder; 20H sump w/SWC 120; Sicce 3.0 return; Vortech MP-10; Sundial T5, DIY Actinic LED (3W Cree). Livestock: Pair of Black & Whites; Midas Blenny; Firefish; Yasha/pistol; Black Leopard Wrasse; LPS and SPS

09/27/2011, 11:36 AM	#11
milspec Registered Member Join Date: Sep 2011 Location: SC Posts: 236	The flat worms will shrivel up and disappear, It will not hurt any other thing in the tank. I have use this on a lot of tanks. If you have a blanket of flat worms, it is a good idea to try to suck most of them out before you dose. The flat worms are the toxic problem not the product. One small bottle will treat a 200 gallon tank two times. I dosed a 125 gallon tank with half a bottle once and other then no flat worms anymore the tank was fine. A day after the initial dose you should do a 25% water change because of all the dead flat worms not because of the product. Last edited by milspec; 09/27/2011 at 11:46 AM.

09/27/2011, 03:33 PM	#12
zigzag1 Registered Member Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: Anderson, Indiana Posts: 1,276	The starfish are likely thriving as they have the opportunity to fill the role. They can act as a safety valve of sorts. If you had to choose between them and nuisance algae, which would you prefer? They may be a blessing in disguise. They will control their own population based upon the food available to them. JMTC & GL! __________________ :beer: Mixed Reef, started 10/2004: 6' BB 125g DT, 100lbs LR, 40g sump, Dual Ehiem 1000 returns, Eshopps dual overflow, JBJ ATO, Vertex IN-180, PM Ca reactor, 250w MH w/VHO Actinic, AC3 w/Aquasurf, Tunze 6105 pair & 40B frag tank 8 Fish, 20+ corals, shrimp, snails, worms, bugs, etc.

09/27/2011, 08:19 AM	#3
Jamhvacr Registered Member Join Date: Jun 2011 Location: Dover, PA Posts: 22	Thanx JaneG! Good idea! I thought harlequins ate ALL starfish though. I'm considering them for sure. I've bin told that any Halichores wrasse will take care of the worms but may also kill the cleaners and janitors.. Idk...

09/27/2011, 08:21 AM	#4
nuff40 Registered Member Join Date: Oct 2010 Location: Louisville, KY Posts: 50	Melanarus wrasse wiped out my flatworm problem in short order

11/23/2011, 12:43 AM	#14
cassklar Registered Member Join Date: Oct 2010 Location: Vacaville CA Posts: 648	How long does it take for a harlequin shrimp to eat the asternia stars I have hundreds and just recently purchased a shrimp I know he is fine because I see him walking around all the time it just that those stars have already eaten some of zoas and I don't know if I should manually take them out or just let the shrimp eat them

11/23/2011, 08:05 AM	#15
SDguy Fish heads unite! Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: San Diego Posts: 23,384	If your flatworm problem is just beginning, I'd say it's the perfect time for a full tank chemical treatment. All the problems I've ever heard of when using such treatments was due to MASSIVE dieoff of thousands upon thousands of flatworms. If you only have a few, the treatement is super easy and worry free. __________________ Peter SDMAS member Marine tanks since 1989. ><((((º>`·.¸¸.·´¯`·.¸.·´¯`·...¸><((((º> ·´¯`·.¸. , . .·´¯`·.. ><((((º> Current Tank Info: 240g butterfly and angel FOWLR. 15g QT.

12/31/2011, 02:03 PM	#16
hythereef Registered Member Join Date: Aug 2010 Location: UK Posts: 25	I have had a problem for about two years with the retrogramma triloba flatworms. My aquarium is in an office and so can only be maintained at weekends. So this Christmas holiday and while my staff are away, has been a good time to prepare for flatworm extermination. When flatworms die they do emit a rather sickly, unpleasant odour. I have both Blue Life Flatworm Control and a pack of Flatworm Exit. I have not yet decided which to use. The tank is 500L net of rock and is a general mixed reef. Like many people on this forum I have siphoned these creatures out for months but they persist! So this week I have siphoned the flatworms out each day for four days and I expect that the population is now fairly low. For those who are not aware, it is important to remove as many flatworms as possible because when they die they exude a toxin which will be very harmfully to to the other inhabitants of the aquarium. I have two 100L barrels of fresh water ready to go. I use Red Sea Pro salt. This 200L of water will enable me to do a very large water change as soon as the treatment is complete. The protein skimmer is cleaned and ready to turn on as soon as worm-death has occurred. In addition to this I have a Tetratec600 canister filter packed with carbon and this will run for a day or so after the water change, hopefully it will help to remove residual toxin from the water. A number of you will have experience with this and I ask if you see any problems with my plan? __________________ Hythereef. 500L Beta tank, 100L sump. LED lighting unit by Eco KR93-48, Red Sea C skim 1800, TECO 15 chiller with UV. 4 wireless programmed Vortech powerheads. Mixed reef, Phosban reactor. Tetratec

01/05/2012, 04:25 PM	#17
hythereef Registered Member Join Date: Aug 2010 Location: UK Posts: 25	Well folks FW Extermination proceeded to plan last Sunday. Judging by the fact that there are only four or five creeping about on the glass I would say it was 99.5% wipe-out. I used Flatworm Exit at approx 120% dose. I ran the carbon until today (4 days) no fish / inverts were harmed or stressed. Question - how soon before I add a second dose to remove stragglers and hatchlings? I think this time I might use Blue Vet in case the stragglers were to resistant to FWExit __________________ Hythereef. 500L Beta tank, 100L sump. LED lighting unit by Eco KR93-48, Red Sea C skim 1800, TECO 15 chiller with UV. 4 wireless programmed Vortech powerheads. Mixed reef, Phosban reactor. Tetratec

01/05/2012, 04:56 PM	#18
aleonn Registered Member Join Date: Aug 2010 Posts: 4,041	My yellow coris wrasse (halichoeres chrysus) exterminated my flatworm population within 3-4 weeks, and got fat in the process. Mine doesn't pick on CUC either. As for asterina starfish, I manually removed hundreds of them for a few months. If I had known about the harlequin shrimp route, I'd have done it long ago .

01/05/2012, 04:56 PM	#19
aleonn Registered Member Join Date: Aug 2010 Posts: 4,041	duplicate Last edited by aleonn; 01/05/2012 at 05:02 PM.

01/06/2012, 01:25 AM	#20
slakker187 Registered Member Join Date: Mar 2009 Location: chico, ca Posts: 76	harlequin shrimp are expensive and dont work very well on asterina stars they prefer large starfish. the ones that i bought were having problems picking them off of the rock. ($120 wasted on four) i tried on my 240g and they didnt do anything. the only thing that worked for me was getting some tweezers coming in the morning when they are all out and snatch them out. also they are voracious coraline algae eaters so the sooner you start your crusade the better. good luck.

01/06/2012, 06:41 AM	#21
sahin Ultimate Reefer Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: London, UK Posts: 8,540	When my tank got flatworms years ago, I got a sixline whcih completely finished them off over a few weeks. No chemicals needed. As for the Asterina stars they come and go with nutrient load (which = micro algae and algae film to them to feed on). They disappeared as soon as my tank entered a low nutrient level.

01/07/2012, 07:43 AM	#22
hythereef Registered Member Join Date: Aug 2010 Location: UK Posts: 25	My six line wrasse does not eat flatworms __________________ Hythereef. 500L Beta tank, 100L sump. LED lighting unit by Eco KR93-48, Red Sea C skim 1800, TECO 15 chiller with UV. 4 wireless programmed Vortech powerheads. Mixed reef, Phosban reactor. Tetratec

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