Coral disease/hitchhikers

I plan on starting more heavily into the corals in the upcoming months and had a few questions. I know many suggest QT corals like fish but with no QT that is not an option at the time. I hate taking the risk since it seems like I see aptasia in many coral and frag tanks and who knows what else can be there ( one local shop keeps sixline wrasses in all their coral tanks which should help?).

How effective how coral dip? Do these kill aptasia? Im not talking the big bad ones you can see I would never buy a coral with visible aptasia on it but I know you run the risk of spores and micro sized ones hitchhiking would these be killed by a coral bath? What else do these coral dips kill? bacteria, pods, etc

Basically without a QT what steps can I take to insure I do not add a ton of bad stuff to my tank when buying corals besides staring at the specimen for any signs of illness.

 

CoralRX is my choice of dip for new corals

I know for a fact it will not kill of even very small Aiptasia , even when they are submerned in a bath 4 X the suggested dosage for dipping corals ( I was experimenting leaving 1 small rock with 3 baby pest nems in the solution mixed at 4 x normal dose , they shrivelled up, became invisible , but 3 days after the rock was put back in my test set up, they were back to normal )

it does kill of crabs of small sizes , which means any wanted acro crabs need to be teased out of the coral with a cocktail stick/ toothpick (its the same thing but different people have different terms for these pointed bits of wood)

it will kill many aquarium pests, flat worms, bugs etc , and naturally some things that are not pests, such as small pods and even amphipods up to 2 and 3 mm have been found in the bottom my my treatment jug after dipping a new SPS colony

Steve

 

You seem to love my post steve!! Thanks for the time and help. So if you see aptasia in a coral tank on another coral is it still somewhat safe to buy a coral with no visible signs of the aptasia? Not sure how to go about preventing these nasty buggers from getting into my tank

 

PghSteeler

if you ever find a way to prevent them getting into the tank, you must promise to share that information with me

visibly inspecting is good
removal or treatment as soon as you spot any, is good
Aiptasia X , Joes juice,
injecting Boiling water, Lemon Juice or Vinegar can help - not 100% succesful
Kalkwassser paste spread on them - has recently worked for me
Peppermint shrimps eat them (but they can also pick at corals)
Copperband butterflies are supposed to eat them , but nobody told mine?
some file fish species will eat them, but they also peck at coral polyps
Aiptasia eating nudibranches will eat them, but you need to find a new home for them once they have eaten away your problem

dealing with any as soon as you see them is better than leaving them alone and later finding yourself plagued by the pests

 

If I discover the secret at prevention I will spread the word lol. I was jsut hoping there was a way to treat all new corals that would kill the bad guys and not the coral guess I will keep dreaming