AEFW, or Acro Eating FlatWorms, is the bane of every coral reefer’s existence. Once in the tank, the treatments are not easy and most expect a 20-30% loss in coral, over and above what you have already lost to the pests. Unlike redbugs which can be treated with a little interceptor in the display tank, the only way to treat AEFW (as far as I can tell), s to remove them fromt he tank and treat them in a separate tank. And be sure that the main display tank is acropora free for 6 weeks. That means, don’t leave any behind or it is food for the AEFW
So, what do you do when the corals are encrusted over the rocks? I don’t know, but I am about to find out. What I thought was alkalinity issues with my tank, turned out instead to be AEFW.
How could I possibly confuse the two? Well, I had an alkalinity problem before and the corals started dying. When an alkalinity swing causes coral to die, though, it starts at the tips. This started at the base.
Not sure what the course of action is and I am open to suggestions. In the meantime, here are some pictures from my tank!
AEFW Eggs on the base of my coral
AEFW Egg Cluster
Close-up of AEFW Eggs on SPS Coral
SPS Dying Due to AEFW
This is what the coral looks like with AEFW
Posted On: Wednesday, March 10th, 2010
Posted In: Reef Blog
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Comments: 2 Responses
good luck!
you’ll need to do some serious damage control. i suggest setting up a separate aquarium and removing all of your acropora from your display tank. it will take a couple months of constant dipping to get rid of them all. and the worms in your display tank will take several weeks to fully die off.
Lousy situation but great pix. Keep us posted.