aptasia

[Geofrog]

I used to use Joe's Juice but found that every week or so they would pop up again. Went with the peppermint shrimp and no sign of the aiptasia. Also, the shrimp tend to hide in the rockwork so I never really see them.

[kwirky]

I don't know if this is why it works, or whether I'm lucky, but I use this method albert explained to me when using joe's juice.

I turn off the tank's pumps and filters for 5 minutes to bring the water stagnant. I make sure the lights are off so nothing gets hot.

I then cover the aiptasia in a little pile of joe's juice so it's completely subsumed in it. It's like this little pyramid like pile of joe's juice completely covering it.

I let it sit like that for 15 minutes with the water stagnant so the joe's juice doesn't get blown away.

Afterwards I use another syringe and suck up the joe's juice pile and I make sure I get all the little bits of aiptasia with it. It kinda disintegrates into little pieces of aiptasia.

After I'm sure I have all the joe's juice and aiptasia bits, then I turn the pumps and lights back on.

And from my experience it's never been a daily battle when using joe's juice. I scour over all new rock and I usually find a little aiptasia polyp before it is even larger than 1/4". I find that aiptasia's quite common from my own experience but it's not a "daily battle." It's more something you have to watch for and be prepared for because I think most people will inevitably experience aiptasia in their tank at one point or another.

I'm kinda uneasy about buying rock from somone getting out of the hobby though. Sometimes somone's getting out of the hobby because certain things they haven't been able to control are just out of hand so they're getting out. I experienced some sub-standard rock from somone "getting out" of the hobby before; got some bad rock covered in aiptasia. Took some drastic measures to deal with it.