What eats anthelia? (1 Viewer)

[aqua-nut]

I have a 150 gallon tank that has been simply overtaken by anthelia.

I am at the point where I can no longer take out the rocks and scrub them again. I've done it a bunch of times and this stuff comes right back.

It was a hitchhiker on a piece of rock I bought from a friend, and looked nice at first... then it went everywhere because I got busy and didn't have time to tear down the tank and scrub the rocks repeatedly.

Does anyone have a sure-fire recommendation for a fish I might add to my tank that will eat this stuff?

If it nips at my other soft corals, I can live with that.

 

[aqua-nut]

Bump! Anyone have any advice to lend me?

 

[decimal]

try peppemint shrimp. they have been known to eat Anthelia.

http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache...ing&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us&client=firefox-a

 

[AquaNerd]

camel shrimp may do it too, but will probably eat a bunch of other stuff you would want to keep as well.

 

[AquaNerd]

wild caught peps may do it, but tank raised peps are usually more subdued with their diet. but it will be hard to get an animal to eat a specific thing in the tank.

 

[aqua-nut]

Peppermint shrimp are cheap. I'll buy a bunch of them and see if they'll start munching on it. Believe me, if they do eat the stuff, they'll think they got dropped into an all you can eat buffet that simply doesn't quit!

 

[jdeveaux]

Possible dumb question alert :? I've been doing some searching to see what Anthelia is to make sure I didn't just add it to my tank and I think I may have. I bought some long flowing, what I thought was pulsing Xena, but it doesn't really pulse. Is that what Anthelia is?

I know if I didn't know what it was I should have gone home to research it first. It looks really nice though But not if it is going to spread everywhere. 8O

 

[aqua-nut]

Without a pic it's hard to tell you if what you have is Anthelia, but it sure sounds like it.

Having it in your tank isn't a bad thing. Allowing to overtake your tank due to tank owner neglect is indeed a bad thing though.

Whenever it decides to spread off the rock its on now, take action and you'll be fine with it.

Pulsing Xenia is much easier to control. It peels off rocks fairly easy and I would spend a half hour once a month harvesting it and throwing it away. I have a little bit of xenia in my tank now, but it's nothing like the amount I had two years ago.

The rapid spread of Anthelia and decrease of pulsing Xenia probably has a lot to do with the fact that I'm adding Kalkwasser to my top off water.

Xenia seems to thrive in high nutrient, moderate to low calcium-level tanks. I'm not totally sure about this evaluation, but it seems to be the case for me anyway.