Preparing for aiptasia war with berghia

[Kyleovski]

As the title suggests, over the span of 5 months or so my tank has been covered by aiptasia, so much so that ive even noticed some have interesting flecks of colours in them on top of the horrid brown colour that they are. Anyways I think one of the reasons for the massive outbreak is I feed heavily to keep nutrients up, This has obviously added lots of scattered food for the aips to grab.
I kinda kicked the can down the road which is my own fault and now they have already nuked a couple of my acro frags I got late last year
Hopefully they breed enough that I can sell them on afterwards and get some decent new acros!

Figured I'd start this thread as a way of documenting the progress.

I have a 44G + sump cube with a few inhabitants listed below, nothing that I would imagine target berghia but maybe I am wrong.

Inhabitants
2x Ocellaris clowns
1x Tailspot blenny
1 x Royal gramma
1x Mandarin
1x Yellow coral goby
1x x priolepis boreus -No idea what this fish is commonly called and they dont seem to have a lot of information online from what I can see
1x Fire shrimp
General CUC like bumble bee snails/ hermits/ copepods/ Other snails

Tank Params
Temp - 26ºC
Salinity - 35PPT
Nitrate - 5ppm +-
Phos - 0.1ppm +-
Alk - 9.2dkh
pH - 8.1-8.25 daily swings

I added 4 berghia in early jan but I think they got scattered over the tank and either have been eaten, died or just never found one another to breed so if they there they have not made a dent yet. I have ordered another 9 berghia that will arrive on Saturday, hopefully ready for the task ahead of them.

I have a bit of a torn mind on what would be better when releasing them into the tank, My thinking is...
Option A: Put them into the display at night and let them crawl out at their own pace and when they get going start adding some of the offspring to the sump to take care of down there.
Option B: Put them into the sump to get the population going where they will be 100% safe from predators but the aiptasia isn't as bad down there, there definitely is enough but not anywhere as bad as the display.

Thoughts?

Pictures of shame:
Display as of today - 14 Feb 2024

Sump
This guy is massive and you can see some the florescent specks on its oral disc

Next update on Saturday when the Berghia's arrive.

 

[JayM]

I put four Berghias in my tank on January 31st. I woke up this morning to find the last of the Aiptasia that I was aware of gone.

Final Score - Berghias 1, Aiptasia 0

Had a couple dozen Aiptasia pop up not long ago and decided that Berghias were my best bet for getting rid of them before they took over. About 2 weeks ago I added 4 Berghias and as of this morning every Aiptasia that I was aware of is gone. Here’s pics/video of the last one: This was a couple...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Daniel]

Option A gets my vote. If you have some in the sump, buy a few more and drop a few in there as well and do both options.

 

[Jmp998]

Regardless you will need the Berghia breeding in your tank with that many Aiptasia, so it will be a few months before you see results. You could put a couple in the sump if you want, but I vote for putting most or all in the display since that is where there are the most Aiptasia (and where they are causing the immediate problem). Also Berghia are not 'smart' about heaters, so depending on how your sump is setup it may not be as safe as you think.

Also, it looks like you have rubble in your sump. This makes it easy to manually transfer some Berghia to your sump later. When most of the Aiptasia are gone from your display just put some Aiptasia-infested rubble in the display for a day or two adjacent to your rockwork. The hungry Berghia will move to the infested rubble to feed and lay eggs. Then you can just put the rubble back in the sump to transfer the Berghia without having to try to catch the Berghia at night. Briefly taking them out of water for the transfer won't hurt the Berghia at all, just be gentle when transitioning between water/air.

 

[kevgib67]

Yes, A is the best way to go. The nudibranchs are nocturnal and having their dinner when any predators are sleeping. Most nudibranch’s predators are aptasia predators. Remember, it might take a generation or two to finish off all the aptasia.

 

[Kyleovski]

So got the berghia later, a week later than expected due to the seller saying his stock was too small and that he’d like to dispatch a bit later so they get bigger. 10 nudis in total.

I’ve since decided I’ll rather try and breed them to get a sizeable population going in case anything in my tank eats them, apparently amphipods eat the eggs and I have a lot of those.

Nudi tank on the left, aiptasia tank centre and copepods right

Left some aiptasia in overnight and some of the new berghia are brown after eating all night

 

[darkwaterperformance]

1 1/2 months ago Jan 12 2024 I put 4 nudis in a 20gallon peninsula with my rock structure absolutely covered in aiptasia and today Feb 27 2024 I have 50 nudis and zero aiptasia. They work so good I was amazed how fast they eat and they reproduce like rabbits I thought they were expensive when I bought 4 for $40 but I actually made money because they reproduce so fast. I also want to mention that I did put them in when the lights were off so they could hide from any predators.

 

[Kyleovski]

1 1/2 months ago Jan 12 2024 I put 4 nudis in a 20gallon peninsula with my rock structure absolutely covered in aiptasia and today Feb 27 2024 I have 50 nudis and zero aiptasia. They work so good I was amazed how fast they eat and they reproduce like rabbits I thought they were expensive when I bought 4 for $40 but I actually made money because they reproduce so fast. I also want to mention that I did put them in when the lights were off so they could hide from any predators.

I put in 4 originally around the same time as you and have not seen them again since, no dent in my aiptasia forests either. put in at lights out as well and I have no wrasse/pepermint shrimp/file fish in the tanks so I assume they dead.

Currently ahve another 10 in a 1G container that im hoping to breed with to continuously add to my tank until the problem is resolved, also currently culturing aips on the side to keep them going after the tank is cleared so that I can add in a few every few weeks just as insurance, also hopefully sell off a few and trade for more corals with all the free real estate ill have once aips are gone

 

[Kyleovski]

Anyone know how long to wait for Berghia to start laying eggs, I've had them in a 1G container for a week now. They’re eating and moving around plenty but no eggs to be seen

 

[Jmp998]

How long for humans to reproduce? Or any animal? Depends on whether you start with a baby or an adult.

Same for Berghia- it depends on age and size when you got them. Generally they need to be at least 1/4” and about 6 weeks post hatching to lay eggs (the latter is temperature dependent). If they are fed well, they will grow faster and be 1/2” or more before they are old enough to start laying. Hard to tell for sure from that pic on my phone, but I would guess those would start laying in 1-2 weeks if fed well and temp in upper 70’s. At first they will only lay 1-2 times a week but more often as they mature (assuming well fed). If you look at them from underneath, you will see an obvious large oval white egg mass in the middle of the slug belly a few days before they start laying. I would not disturb them to try to look, just look if they are crawling on a clear glass wall or something. Those look healthy and happy as best I can tell.

 

[Kyleovski]

How long for humans to reproduce? Or any animal? Depends on whether you start with a baby or an adult.

Same for Berghia- it depends on age and size when you got them. Generally they need to be at least 1/4” and about 6 weeks post hatching to lay eggs (the latter is temperature dependent). If they are fed well, they will grow faster and be 1/2” or more before they are old enough to start laying. Hard to tell for sure from that pic on my phone, but I would guess those would start laying in 1-2 weeks if fed well and temp in upper 70’s. At first they will only lay 1-2 times a week but more often as they mature (assuming well fed). If you look at them from underneath, you will see an obvious large oval white egg mass in the middle of the slug belly a few days before they start laying. I would not disturb them to try to look, just look if they are crawling on a clear glass wall or something. Those look healthy and happy as best I can tell.

Yep I think I just got impatient as I thought they looked big enough, which they were, as I had eggs laid yesterday, two coils both on the small heater in the container!

 

[Kyleovski]

We have eggs!

About a week and a bit of the Berghia being in the breeding tank.

At least two egg spirals that I can see on the heater

Berghia themselves are getting huge and eating like crazy

Once the eggs hatch and have grown out a bit I’ll be transferring a bunch of berghia to the display tank so that they can get cracking on the aiptasia in the display tank.

 

[Jmp998]

Good progress. I’m not familiar with that type of heater-depending on how warm the surface gets, those eggs might not hatch. However the Berghia should lay again in the next few days regardless. Hatch time is about 11-14 days.

 

[Sleeping Giant]

We have eggs!

About a week and a bit of the Berghia being in the breeding tank.

At least two egg spirals that I can see on the heater

Berghia themselves are getting huge and eating like crazy

Once the eggs hatch and have grown out a bit I’ll be transferring a bunch of berghia to the display tank so that they can get cracking on the aiptasia in the display tank.

congratulations on the eggs and those adults look gigantic and dark from the aiptasia, good job. I'm sure you could add some adults to your rocks soon

 

[Kyleovski]

Good progress. I’m not familiar with that type of heater-depending on how warm the surface gets, those eggs might not hatch. However the Berghia should lay again in the next few days regardless. Hatch time is about 11-14 days.

Heater is a 15W Nicrew heater, set to 25 degrees celsius. Cant wait for them to hatch!

 

[Kyleovski]

congratulations on the eggs and those adults look gigantic and dark from the aiptasia, good job. I'm sure you could add some adults to your rocks soon

They grow surprisingly fast, probably 25% bigger than when I got them a week earlier

 

[Kyleovski]

Wee update

I’ll be attempting to capture a few of the berghia today or tomorrow to move into the main display, I’ll probably leave around 3 of the adults in the breeding tank while the rest can get to work on the display.

There is now also egg spirals all over the place, easily 1000s of eggs so I imagine the aiptasia consumption is gonna drastically increase, however on the aiptasia front, my breeding container I setup to grow aiptasia has crashed and all the aiptasia have withered away. They annoyingly grow in every conceivable place in my tank but when you try and grow them they die!

 

[1ocean]

love it

 

[Jmp998]

Wee update

I’ll be attempting to capture a few of the berghia today or tomorrow to move into the main display, I’ll probably leave around 3 of the adults in the breeding tank while the rest can get to work on the display.

There is now also egg spirals all over the place, easily 1000s of eggs so I imagine the aiptasia consumption is gonna drastically increase, however on the aiptasia front, my breeding container I setup to grow aiptasia has crashed and all the aiptasia have withered away. They annoyingly grow in every conceivable place in my tank but when you try and grow them they die!

Unfortunately this is common. They only grow when/where you don’t want them. I have crashed a few aiptasia cultures myself.

 

[mattyhubble97]

Any updates on how this turned out? Any babies?!