AOG skirt turning white/decaying!!

[yell0w]

I have had the AOG for about 2-3 months now and recently I started to notice that 1-2 poly are starting to have white/loss in color skirts. They are the only zoa that are like this in my tank. Should I cut off the poly to stop it from spreading to the other poly. Thanks

[benihana]

I would do a FW dip with them...I am guessing you have Zoa eating nudi's. It sounds like what I had a few years ago

[yell0w]

How small r the nudi and can I see them?

[yell0w]

i don't think I have nudis. My other zoa are doing great and I just blew water over my zoa and didn't c anything. Unless the nudis only come out at night. Hmmm... IDK but I'll do a FW dip. Do I have to match Ph? Or is temp alone good enough. P.S. my clowns host in them and I don't know if this has anything to do with my clowns hosting it.

[benihana]

I would match it as close as possible, but don't kill yourself trying to get it eaxact. AoG's are pretty hardy, so I would think that as long as the temp is close, they should be fine.

As far as size, you should be able to see them, but they will not be big....about the size of the end of a ball point pen

[Nanofins]

Are you saying the skirts are turning white/getting pale? Was it gradual? Or are they decaying and falling off/disappearing? Those are two different things. How do the polyps themselves look, aside from the skirts? In high light, low nutrient systems, such as those heavily skimmed and lit by halides or very bright T-5's, you'll notice the skirts of some palys, including AOG's, will get pale and whispy as they acclimate to the new system. This is not a sign of sickness and is normal/fine. On the other hand, if the skirts are actually coming off and are gone, that is a problem. I would not recommend a freshwater dip for this, but rather a dip in Revive to see if it's bugs. If it's bacterial, you're better off getting some antibacterial remedy such as Furan II and doing 20min soaks in a cup. Again, this is only necessary if you are actually seeing polyps lose their skirts or closing up/disappearing, not if the skirts are just getting pale.

[yell0w]

The skirts are getting pale/turning white the skirts aren't falling off/disappearing but this is only happening to one poly. The other 20 or so poly are still good. They were higher in my tank but I moved them down. Could this reduction in closeness to the light cause this?

[Nanofins]

I would doubt that a reduction in light would cause the skirts to pale, but I don't think you have anything to worry about. Skirt color in and of itself in not an indicator of health and can change a lot from one set of conditions to another, and not all morphs/species react the same, so your others may not go through this change. As long as the polyps are open and the color of the oral disk looks good, then I think the polyps are just going through a normal change in your system. My guess would be that the polyps went from a higher nutrient system to a lower nutrient system in your tank and are changing to adapt. I have had this happen on a few AOG types in the past. I went over Ray's place once and saw some of his AOG types in his tank and they looked crazy. The skirts were glassy and almost clear and very whispy. Even the disc color was pale behind the pigments; made them look ghostly. Same polyp as those in my system only mine have almost black skirts. I've moved mine to a tank with more light and lots of skimming and after a few months the skirts began to go pale. I think you're fine and I would not overreact by doing any drastic dips or anything unless you notice an actual change in the health of the polyps (ie closing up, shriveling).

Good luck! :beerchug:

[yell0w]

K thanks everyone for your input. I'll wait it out and c if it gets worse

[Bakes]

I'm having a similar issue with a frag of Red People Eaters that I got from the frag swap. They are functioning normal, open and close, color is healthy. The little polyps on the rims on one side are slowly deteriorating. I have had a few nudi's on some of the other colonies that I have but they have all been healthy for about a month. There is no sign of nudi's on this frag and have checked it daily and nightly. What do I do?

[reeffamily]

had some start to turn white. moved them farther out of the light. now all are gaining color again

[Flounder]

Zoa eating nudi's.

Any kind of dip did the trick when I had them. I should tell you that these little buggers are actually kinda cool in my book. (I dont want them, and kill them everytime I see them) But they can change colors to blend in better with whatever colored zoanthid/paly they are munching on.

Dip does NOT kill their eggs, which look like a white spiral on any polyp flesh

http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd199/Flounderfish/IMG_3237.jpg

[Bakes]

I dipped this frag in coralrx before i put them in, no sign of nudi's or eggs. they arent acting like they have them either.

[BrianN]

Hey Bakes, You should get rid of them before they affect the rest of your corals. If you would like i can come get them and make sure they get disposed of properly.

[Bakes]

haha yeah, sure. Why didnt I think of that?!?!

[David Grigor]

Like Carl mentions, nudis are the prime suspect until proven otherwise. A single RX dip will not be adequate. You really need to quarantine and do multiple dips several days apart to be sure to stamp out the reproductive cycle. If have multiple colonies/frag of zoanthid and didn't do this procedure everytime it may have been already infested system. Sometimes if colonies are large enough and multiply you may not notice for quite sometime until nudi population explodes.

[ReefingSAW]

since this thread was brought back up from the thread I'll ask me question here also. I have some sunny d's and the skirts dont have color they are just brown. Where do you people put your sunny d at?

[deneed4spd]

I also have that problem with sunny d's. mine is mid tank.

[ReefingSAW]

i had mines in mid tank right under the mh 250 still no sparky skirts i'm trying lower light now. Anyone here dose vit C?