Filefish test day 1

[tat2z_21]

I have recently been overtaken by the dreadful, genetically engineered Aptasia and Majano anemone's. I was using Aptasia X, and Joes juice, but found that ordering them by the case was getting a little out of hand. So I stopped and thought about it. What could be making these things explode and multiply so quickly. Then I found out that these aliens from the sea any attack on this anemone stimulates spawning and ultimately releases thousands of Planula Larval stages to colonize or recolonize the area at a later date when conditions improve. Kind of a self preservation defense. "Devils I tell you" So as I killed one with a smile, it would smile back with 18 more popping up in its place. So I tried several different natural means of ridding myself of this. Peppermint Shrimp - No good. Just stole the food I fed to the tank from corals. CBB - No good decided that my duncans and Acans were a better treat. Berghia - Bought six (120.00 later) and found that my Niger Trigger likes to munch the bags while acclimating, and killed off 4 of them. So I released the other two into the tank and never seen them again. Found out later that the Peppermints like them as a tasty treat as well. So now I am trying a Matted Filefish. Here is my journal on it so far.

28 Feb - Recieved filefish. Swimming around good, and seems to be hunting the crushed coral and rocks. Seen him eating but it seems to be after pods. Hopefully he will change his taste and move on to the real treats.

29 Feb - Seems he has found his place in the tank and seems very happy. He is fully colored up. Still just hovering over the terrible Anemone's with no real notice of nibbling

1 Mar - The filefish is definately out and about and it seems that the tankmates has gotten used to his presence, and the same with him. However when ever I enter the room he seems to go back to his place and wait for me to leave. Still no sign of Aptasia or Majano decline. Patiently waiting.

2 Mar - Same behavior, still no sign. Why won't you just do what I know you want. Iknow deep down inside you are feeling the urge to hover over a fresh bed of aptasia and pick untill your heart is content. Don't fight the feeling any more. Just let it go little guy.

Has anyone else had good luck with these guys or should I just give up and start an aptasia farm.

 

[tat2z_21]

Oh and I know that I have another issue with the Green Hair algea, been doing water change after water change to fix this. Of course all of my tests indicate 0 for phosphates but I believe that is all of the hair algea eating it up.

 

[eww]

Hey Floyd. We had lost of success with a matted file fish in our old 70g tank. We had been over run with majanos and we also had several aiptasia. We added our buddy and it took a while for him to adjust. It was a week or two later and suddenly we started noticing significant holes in the mojano population. He seemed to hunt and eat at night when no one was up to see him. Closet eater!!! Anyway he completely eradicated a few hundred majanos in a month or two's time, some in places I have no idea how he got to them, and then turned on the aiptasia. A few weeks later there were no signs of either pest. We fed our tank rather heavily and he never touch anything else in the tank with us. We gave it out on loan to Todd and it proceeded to do the same in his tank although after it cleaned all the pest anemone's up for him it seemed to turn to some of his zoas and acans. It was never witnessed that he was the actual munching culprit but given his "closet eating" I guess that's not so surprising. We sold the fish to another reefer on here that had been battling majanos for years and he was tickled to report very quickly that the pests were rapidly disappearing in his tank where nothing he had tried had ever worked before. Hopefully you will have the same type of luck only without the extra munching that Todd experienced.

 

[trido]

I highly recommend a DIY aptasia zapper. I let a mother aptasia get too big and when I nuked it a few weeks ago it released a bunch of spores. Two days ago, I noticed a couple had popped up and when I went to work I found about 15 aptasia's and nuked them all. ONLY ONE survived and will soon meet its electrical doom. I will never use any form of kalk paste in any of my tanks ever again.

 

[mfinn]

I added a matted filefish to my 240 which had countless majano's and a few aptasias 6-7 months ago.
At first I hardly saw the fish, but never really noticed a differnce in the majano population. After a few weeks I figured I got a filefish that didn't like them.
But a couple months ago, I suddenly noticed,,,,,,,,,,,there were no majano's or aptasias,,,,,,anywhere.
I say give it time.

 

[returnofsid]

Mine took a week or so to really start going to town. Once it did, IT WAS ON! Whole patches of Majano disappeared, every day. Then, I moved it to my 75, to go after all the Aiptasia. A few days later, it was swimming around, healthy as can be in the morning, being eaten by a Maxi Mini anemone, that afternoon. Grrrr. Time to get another from Kevin!

 

[eww]

I added a matted filefish to my 240 which had countless majano's and a few aptasias 6-7 months ago.
At first I hardly saw the fish, but never really noticed a differnce in the majano population. After a few weeks I figured I got a filefish that didn't like them.
But a couple months ago, I suddenly noticed,,,,,,,,,,,there were no majano's or aptasias,,,,,,anywhere.
I say give it time.

Martin, long time no post. Good to see you here again buddy.

 

[mfinn]

Hey Eric.



One downer to the filefish, I'm missing a bunch of maxi-mini's

 

[returnofsid]

I also noticed, if I didn't keep my filefish fed, every few days, it would show interest in Zoanthids. I learned to keep it fed.

 

[justforfun]

zapper= more aptasia down the road...... give it time floyd he will eat them and all your zoas but lets get rid of the pest before you do a restart.....maybe ill come and do some fish whispering this weekend.....

 

[Bosco83]

I got one and he was in qt for two weeks and hid all every time I came in the room. Now that he is in the display tank he is out all the time eats nori like a tang and frozen food. He hasn't even touched the aiptasia yet. I keep hoping with time he will start eating them up. What's really annoying is I haven't had any aiptasia for over a year and a half then all of the sudden I have seen like five so I know there is more.

Brian

 

[Bosco83]

Oh yea I even fed an aiptasia hoping he would try and get the food and then realize he liked eating the anemone too.

 

[tat2z_21]

Hey thanks you guys I will keep you updated on what happens.

 

[Chichas01]

Have you considered just removing your substrate? Seems like that might help in eliminating a majority of them right off. Would probably help your algae issue as well and then you could always replace later once things have evened out.

 

[Ugla]

Mine cleaned out tank in 3 days. Now he eats dried Mysis and seems pretty happy. Has been in the tank for a couple of months and has not bothered any corals.

I am a happy reefer. Been fighting majanos for over 12 years.

 

[tat2z_21]

Well he has been in there now for 8 days, thought I seen him picking at a majano, but still no sign of him releasing the beast. I sit at the tank and watch him which probably freaks him out, (it would freak me out) so I am just going to forget about it and see what happens.

 

[DolphinLVR]

Well he has been in there now for 8 days, thought I seen him picking at a majano, but still no sign of him releasing the beast. I sit at the tank and watch him which probably freaks him out, (it would freak me out) so I am just going to forget about it and see what happens.

Good way to approach it

 

[Ugla]

My filefish only eats majanos when the lights are out for some reason.

 

[tat2z_21]

A closet eater huh. You aren't calling him fat are you.

 

[Bosco83]

I put some aiptasia x on a couple of my larger one's and then a few minutes later my filefish was picking at it and I could see the white powder sifting through his gills. After that he was swimming around all the rock looking very intently at them. I still haven't seen him eat or pick at any other aiptasia though but it seemed like a good sign.

Brian