Pingback: Aiptasia Eaters: Eradicating This Pest Anemone - Reefs. Tags: aiptasia, aiptasia anemone, aiptasia eating filefish, berghia nudi, copperband butterfly, peppermint shrimp One Response to Aiptasia Eaters: Eradicating This Pest Anemone To stay up to date on the latest saltwater reef aquarium topics and news sign up for a FREE account here! Good luck and have fun watching your new critters help you fight the evil aiptasia! Hitch hikers do not put up No Vacancy signs when occupying your stuff so you will need to just assume they are already there. Do Peppermint Shrimp eat detritus An additional appealing feature of the peppermint shrimp is the wide variety of foods that it is willing to consume without hesitation. If you have a problem in your tank you can post it in the REEF DISCUSSION FORUM and we will help you! Always pay attention to the rocks and frags you buy. The peppermint shrimp is a saltwater cleaner shrimp species that is frequently used in reef aquariums because it eats aiptasia anemones, which are a popular food source for them. There are tons of ways to prevent and eradicate aiptasia. It is best to try to remove or kill the larger aiptasia to help the animals focus on the smaller hard to reach ones. Once they seem to enjoy eating them you can try to put them back in your display. The floating particles will entice curiosity at the very least and possible help them acquire the taste for your worst enemy. If they still do not want to try to eat one you can actually take a large aiptasia, chop it up as best you can, and dump it in the tank with the fish like you would mysis shrimp. Once they get hungry enough they begin to forage through the rock and may stumble onto the aiptasis, thus triggering their need to eat more. Simply setup a quarantine tank with a rock that has aiptasia on it and leave the creatures in the tank for a week or so. If your fish or shrimp is not eating them you can attempt to train them to. This method is used because berghia require Aiptasia to live so once the pest is removed, the berghia will starve, whereas the peppermint will scavenge for other food that is remaining in the tank.Copperband butterfly fish image via Īiptasia removal can be a chore. We then encourage aquarists to add a few peppermint shrimp once the Aiptasia has been decimated to ensure new infestations do not reoccur. For large infestations of Aiptasia where polyps are greater than a half inch in diameter and cover a majority of the aquarium, we recommend adding our captive bred Berghia Nudibranch species to help begin eradication of the Aiptasia. Peppermint shrimp can sometimes ignore Aiptasia anemones, especially when there is a lot of supplemental food. The peppermint shrimp is found primarily in the Atlantic, Caribbean, and Gulf of Mexico where Aiptasia species are found. Peppermint Shrimp make for great grazers. It is often confused by novice aquarists with the camelback shrimp, (Rhynchocinetes durbanensis) which will not consume Aiptasia, has a more erratic pattern of white and red, and is found in the Pacific. A vibrant addition to the aquarium, this shrimp is a favorite of many hobbyists. The peppermint shrimp gets its name due to the red stripes that run horizontally down the body. As they become more accustomed to aquarium life, they will likely be more active during the day. Due to their nocturnal nature, they will likely hide in the rockwork during the day and forage during the night on anemones and leftover food. These shrimp grow to around 3 inches in length and consume large amounts of the troublesome pest anemones. The peppermint shrimp, Lysmata wurdemanni, is a great addition to saltwater aquariums experiencing problems with Aiptasia anemones.
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