Lets talk Valonia

[PoonTang]

I actually have an emerald crab in my tank but honestly I have never seen him do anything other than sit in 1 of my acros at night. Luckily he doesnt seem to be doing any damage.
As far as manual removal goes i have been siphoning them out when possible or if they are imbedded in my rocks then i burst them and siphon out the guts. Now a fellow told me he got rid of his by just popping them all and eventually they never came back. This goes against everything we were always told about valonia, this causes it to spread. However upon further discussion we surmised that an emerald crab just bursts them and couldnt possibly eat all of the guts so what gives? Well we think that perhaps because the Emerald is only bursting the small ones, and these are probally not sexually mature yet, so releasing thier guts is a moot point and they wont spread. Given enough time the population would eventually perish. Has anyone else had any experience popping them and had them go away? Having said this is there anyone out there with access to a microscope who would be able to look at the bubble guts at various stages of growth and see if there is any evidence of spores?