Parasitic Tegastidae copepods "Black Bugs"

Frogger · #1 03-10-2019, 09:09 PM

black bugs 3 by Glenn Murray

Two of the bugs on acro circled. Taken with macro Olympus T5 zoomed in all the way cropped and enlarged. These guys are small

Will get better picture when I get my microscope out.

Frogger · #2 03-16-2019, 11:52 PM

copepod 1 by Glenn Murray,

This is a side view at 800 times magnification. The front end is the wider section at the bottom. For scale I believe the round ball like structures at the top are zooxanthellae cells.

Frogger · #3 03-16-2019, 11:55 PM

copepod3 by Glenn Murray

This is a view of 4 of them seen at 60 time magnification on the dissecting scope. They seem to hang out on the polyps and inside the corallites. There is hundreds of these guys on a small 2" frag.

Frogger · #4 03-16-2019, 11:59 PM

copepod 2 by Glenn Murray

The red dot is the front of this guy. This is a top down view at 800 times magnification.

Frogger · #5 03-17-2019, 12:08 AM

To date I have used 2 treatments of interceptor at 100%. I did the 3rd treatment at 160%. I just treated today, 4th treatment at 240% of the recommended dosage. From what I can see I can go up to 400%.

So far the treatments only seemed to reduce the population of these copepods. It has slightly affected the amphipod population and does not appear to have had a major impact on my snails. Fish and corals show no sign of stress.

Will keep you posted. Like I said before I have received acro cuttings from many different reefers locally. I noticed it on the last couple of frags I bought which have been treated with bayer and are in the frag tank. Those frags have not set foot in my display tank.

The little buggers that I have in the display tank I must have gotten earlier. Every cutting I have has been dipped in Coral RX. Coral RX does not in phase these guys. They are just a tiny little dot with a hand lens and are really not visible. I did not start finding these guys until I was looking at them under the microscope.

DKoKoMan · #6 03-17-2019, 12:31 AM

Ugh ... thanks for all the information on this. It’s crazy how many things attach to corals which are hard to see with the naked eye. I am fascinated with the under microscope photos of these little pests. Have you figured out if they are eating the acros skin? Or just irrating the polyps? Also you may have answered earlier, but are they taking to any other corals or just acros?

Frogger · #7 03-17-2019, 01:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DKoKoMan

Ugh ... thanks for all the information on this. It’s crazy how many things attach to corals which are hard to see with the naked eye. I am fascinated with the under microscope photos of these little pests. Have you figured out if they are eating the acros skin? Or just irrating the polyps? Also you may have answered earlier, but are they taking to any other corals or just acros?

Because they are almost impossible to see I cannot be sure. Before I started treating I could see them on most of the acropora that are close to the front glass. Since I have been treating I can only see them on my colony of Shades of fall and my orange passion frag. The orange passion frag has them the worst. This is the one I am able to take out of the tank to look at under the microscope. With my optivisor on and a bright light at night I can just make out the little spots moving around on the orange passion. I don't want to treat the orange passion with bayer because if I do then I will not be able to monitor how effective the control is.

I have no idea what they are doing but they are definitely aggravating the corals and the polyps are not fully extending. In each of the corallites there are several of these guys