what slug eats???

Hey everyone!!!!

I have a question I have a flower pot coral and their is sponge growing on it....what slug is the one that eats that??

 

A slug that eats sponge? I have no idea I always try to keep sponges alive in my tank lol.

 

well it is probably some type of nudibranch and I wouldn't recomend getting one. Most are highly toxic and if they die they can totaly nuke your tank.

 

+1. Sponges are good for your tank and nudis can be very very bad.

 

and who would want to eat sponge bob anyway

 

Well, he can have a point here. Sponges can take over a coral and wipe it out. But you can always just take out the coral and remove the sponge manually, if it gets to that point. But I would wait and see befoe doing anything really. I have sponges on my torch, in some zoa's, and in my GSP's and none of them have been affected by the sponges what so ever

 

ok...so should i just manually take it out and leave place the sponges back in the tank?? like the sponge is growing on top of my flower pot...and i dont want my coral to die =(

 

Just for the record, most nudibranchs won't nuke your tank. It would be a miracle if you could pick out the species that would eat your particular sponge, though. The only very toxic nudibranchs are the phyllidiids, and they aren't found as hitchhikers very often (in fact, I don't know of anyone ever getting one, but it's possible). These look like lozenge-shape slugs, usually black with red, yellow, green, or blue bumps, or a combination of these colors.

The Sea Slug Forum - Phyllidia varicosa
The Sea Slug Forum - Phyllidiella pustulosa

They lack the external gills of the dorids like the purple Hypselodoris species often sold at the LFS,

The Sea Slug Forum - Hypselodoris bullocki

and they don't have the cerata like the aeolids, tergepedids and glaucids that eat corals or zoanthids or anemones, and sometimes other stuff.

The Sea Slug Forum - Cuthona amoena
The Sea Slug Forum - Favorinus pacificus
The Sea Slug Forum - Berghia verrucicornis

There are accounts of people becoming ill just from breathing the AIR in the room with a tank containing phyllidiids, and they may leach toxins into the tank even if they aren't stressed. The normal nudibranchs you find in reef tanks aren't going to do this, and usually die and disappear without any adverse effects.

Cheers,



Don