Kessil

Imidacloprid (Bayer) and vermetid snails

I'm planning to re-do my tank to get rid of vermetids and wonder if will kill vermetids or not. Vermetids can hide in the shell but the stuff is still quite powerful. I don't want to bring those beasts to the new tank and wonder if frag dip will help.
Any opinions?
 
I don't believe a tank could ever be vermetids free lol. Sooner or later they will get in.
I agree. I think you're waging a losing battle. Feed coral food less, crush more.

I think @Flagg37 restarted his tank because of vermatid, and he still has vermatid in his new tank, though much better controlled.


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The battle already lost - every inch has snails and the more I crash it the worse it gets. I don’t feed corals, only fish, nitrates are low, corals starving. Easier to start from scratch than to keep starving everything imho. And its always fun, isn’t it? The question is how to prevent or at least minimize it in the future. Will bayer dip kill it or not?


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I agree it seems like they will always get in but I am also interested to hear if any dips kill them as Eugene originally asked. More as control than complete prevention.


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I think that Bayer would kill them. But at the end of a narrow diameter tube, I kinda wonder how much Bayer actually gets to the actual snail.


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I think that Bayer would kill them. But at the end of a narrow diameter tube, I kinda wonder how much Bayer actually gets to the actual snail.


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That is a reason why I asked - I read that vermetid can close the tube and prevent bayer of getting inside. Wonder if its true or not.


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Bayer doesn't work. I tested it before with the following.
  • Bayer in higher than normal dipping conditions for 30 minutes
  • RO water dip for 45 minutes
Both were tested with a zoa rock with 5 vermetids on them and both were unsuccessful. The zoas suffered more than the vermetids at the higher concentration of Bayer.

Manually crushing/breaking the shells of the vermetids is the only thing that has worked for me. Gluing would work as well, but that's quite a bit of glue to use. My cleaner shrimps would eat the vermetids once the tubes/shells are crushed/broken. The vermetid population eventually crashed after awhile.
 
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Bayer doesn't work. I tested it before with the following.
  • Bayer in higher than normal dipping conditions for 30 minutes
  • RO water dip for 45 minutes
Both were tested with a zoa rock with 5 vermetids on them and both were unsuccessful. The zoas suffered more than the vermetids at the higher concentration of Bayer.

Manually crushing/breaking the shells of the vermetids is the only thing that has worked for me. Gluing would work as well, but that's quite a bit of glue to use. My cleaner shrimps would eat the vermetids once the tubes/shells are crushed/broken. The vermetid population eventually crashed after awhile.

Thank you, that's what I though. Will simply discard any piece of coral with vermetids.
 
I use the flat end of my tongs to crush the shells. My wrasses have taken to following that around for a nice snack.


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Eugene, my takeaway message would not be to discard any coral with vermetids, but that they are ubiquitous but controllable.


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There may have been a couple factors in my situation. First, I think since my last tank was my first one I didn’t know what to look for until it was too late. Second, I wonder if there could possibly be different variants of them. The ones I had before multiplied insanely. The ones I have now are much more manageable. I may kill 10/month. Also, I’ve never observed any of them putting out their webbing to catch food with. They’ve never been a nuisance to other corals, just an eye sore to me.

I got new rock when I restarted and bleached it it cute it. If I was to attempt to reuse the rock I had, I would use the muriatic acid. I think the hole is just too small to let the dip kill them. When I bleached my rocks I let them sit for a couple weeks in it so they would have either died from the bleach or starvation (at least that’s my theory).
 
Mine started to grow from the areas I can't get into - from the back and bottom of the rocks and all crevices that's hidden. I crushed what was visible but it spread faster than I could get to it. I read that vermetids harmless and will dye by itself so I fed less - at some point I think I starved the tank to the point they stopped to spread - I fed fish once in couple days, 0 nitrates, 0 phosphates, corals pale, LPS starving, no coraline grow. But once I started to care about corals the snails spread like a plague too.
Also some LPS completely covered with them ( I was probably too gentle trying not to disturb corals), and some SPS that I would try to save. Acans, euphylias have snails everywhere - very hard to crash it without cutting flesh. I'll try to clean it manually wherever it's possible.
Anyway - I have new rocks already prepared - so no need to save old one, will start fragging softies and LPS soon, and will take of them before it's too late.
 
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