I just ordered some zoas from one of our sponsors. Honestly, I have never dipped any of my coral, but after having a rock with hair algae and a bristle worm, I do understand the need for it. I was going to purchase a dip, but they were sold out. Is there a way I can do this with stuff from around the house, or with something I could buy at like Wal-Mart? I live in Batesville, and don't have many options as far as LFS. I wondered if any of you had any tips you could share.
If your just dipping zoa's, not coral, 3 minutes in freshwater RO will do the trick; I recently was advised of this by Norman and it has worked well.
Thanks for the responses. My blue hermit crabs have actually cleaned up one of the rocks I had with it, but there is one they won't touch. The shipment is mainly zoas, but there are also two palys. I assume those are close to the same. I also have a Green Star Polyp coming. Normally, I float my corals before adding them to the tank. When I receive them, do I float them first, then do the freshwater dip, & then add them to the tank?
A freshwater dip is good for soft corals and a few LPS. It is always best to temp acc all fish and inverts before starting a dip. Also make sure the salinity in the bag is the same as in your system. This can be adjusted during acc. if done slowly. For removing algae from frag plugs, (plug only do not dip the coral in solution) frag racks, and rocks you can remove from the tank, dip them in a 20% solution of hydrogen peroxide. This should be a last resort for rock as you could kill other organisms in the rock and when added back to the tank cause a nitrate spike thus making the situation worse. Algae problems are a direct result of a nutrient rich system and this has to be addressed before the algae will go away.
This is the rock. Sorry for the quality. It's a cell phone photo & my lights are about to shut off. I've had this rock for 4 months. It's got a ricordea, montipora, & green mushroom. I bought the rock because it was the only ricordea in the store. I shouldn't have bought it because of the montipora on it. I'm not at the level in this hobby yet to be keeping it. The hair has stayed on the rock, but does seem to be getting taller.
I'm thinking about trying to remove the ricordea & mushroom, and taking the rock out of my system. There is probably no saving the montipora anyway. And it might be work getting this rock out of my system before the hair algae does take off.
I went ahead and removed the rock from the tank. I removed the mushroom & ricordea, and put them back in the tank. I thought I had them secured, but they blew away. I think the mushroom should be ok. I'm hoping that it'll find somewhere to attach to, and surprise me one of these days. If I lose the ricordea, it'll be ok. I think I paid maybe $40 for the whole rock. My thinking was that I'll probably spend more than $40 trying to remove the hair algae if it was to start spreading. And I also learned a good lesson, sometimes that is worth more.
I got my order in today, and used the advice. I think it really helped. The zoas started trying to open after I put them in the tank. I post a photo in my tank thread.
