Helping a friend

When I first entered this hobby i had a 30 gal tank. When i upgraded to a 90 I sold it to a buddy. He suffered from excess money/little patience/ little knowledge. I tried to help him but often he would do too much too fast

Now after all of his livestock dying he is left with a tank with a few shrimp (golden coral banded, pistol) and a few coral (frogspawn, xenia, favia brain etc) he is ready to sell it off. He has a problem with worms and aiptasia. I told him with a little work, time and knowledge we could get his tank up and running in good shape.

First things first is the pests. While unconfirmed, he blames the fish deaths on the worms. From mylimited experience with the creatures I believe they are Amphinomidae (Fireworms). I've pulled some of the larger one out (upwards of 6-8 inches) but he has several more that are smaller and not as easy to manually remove. Are these guys dangerous? Best removal

Now I have dealt with aiptasia before but usually only a few at a time. His tank prob has 5 large ones and 10 small ones. What is teh best way to mass kill off these things?

 

a wrasse plus a few berghia nudibranches

 

Hello, without knowing the parameters of the system, it will be hard to ascertain the cause of the fishes demise.

The worms are harmless, and are beneficial to the system. They help by eating uneaten food and detritus.

I have found a Copperband Butterfly fish to be the best meathod of control and removal of aptasia. But, your friend is losing fish, so an additional fish cannot be added at this time.

If you can get some parameters I will be able to provide additional aid.

Please include:
-The length of time the aquarium has been setup.
-Average temps
-ph,ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate.
-A list of aquarium components, mainly filtration and flow.

Thanks,

Sonny

 

Aiptasia X. You could add a peppermint shrimp but not with the pistol and copper band

 

well the fish die off was months ago. Its been running but little has been done to it. So as for parameters at the time of fish death, i don't know. I will be testing and doing water changes, system cleaning on it today.

I think he blames the worms because he found one eating a dead chromis. I am under the impression that the bristles are poisonous so wouldn't that affect the fish?

As for the aiptasia X, I've seen the product and heard good things, just figured it would take forever to kill 15+ of the things. Peppermint shrimp is an option however kinda hit and miss at times. The copperband Butterfly would be cool and beneficial but the system is only 30g with several softies (kenya, xenia, etc). From my knowledge these fish need 50+ gallons and are prone to nibble on softies.

 

I tested the water as of yesterday afternoon they are:

Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 100ppm
Phosphate: 3ppm
Salinity: 1.026

He hasn't done a water change in like 2 months so that's why i assume his nitrates and phosphates are so high. That and the fish death etc.

Don a 60% water change tonight then gonna go from there