While it is believed that red Planaria get most of their nutrients from photosynthesis, we also know that the flatworms do get some nutrients from the water column. To accomplish this, we added more filtering material Purigen in our case and we also reduced the amount of food entering the aquarium. The skimmer was also adjusted to pull more dissolved organic material. Also, because we now know flatworms release toxins when they die, tripled the amount of carbon as a precaution.
Next was the natural predator. Lastly was the manual removal. This technique is fairly simple. What you do is combine airline tubing with a rigid tube to create a cheap and easy to manage flatworm siphon. You then target siphon these worms out, greatly reducing their numbers. After combining all these methods and giving this approach roughly three weeks, we came to the following conclusions.
Reducing the nutrients was not really very effective, since the worms are photosynthetic. The worms would still quickly multiply and fill the spots where the worms were manually removed. As for our predators, the Target Mandarin did not aggressively eat these pests, though it did pick around them causing some to detach from the rock work. The sixline wrasse, on the other hand, went did attack the worms.
Now the sixline did not take it upon its own effort to pick and search for the flatworms, but if one or two occasionally floated around, it would eat them. My bet is on the mandarins, but like I said, mine doesn't even touch flatworms. Some of the ORA mandarins aren't actually trained. I met a dude at the LFS who said him and his buddy bought a few and they had to train them themselves. On the other hand, an old LFS got in a shipment of them and they all ate frozen.
It's hit and miss. Next time I come in, please let me know which tank has the flatworms. Lol I'm surprised you didn't see them.
They actually stay off the corals and just sit on the sides. I think the coris is eating them, but I might throw a mandarin in there too. I've tried two six lines's, a yellow coris, and even a velvet nudibranch to try to naturally dispose of the pests and none worked.
I have had worms for months and am planning Flatworm exit now since nothing else has worked and I'm sick of Lookin at them. Good luck! What LFS? I live in the Bay Area to so I want to know I had a problem with flatworms too in several of my tanks.
I was going to ask this too. Can you have two different wrasses together? I have a cleaner wrasse.. Could I have a different type? He pecks at the glass some, but not a lot.
My six line doean't touch flatworms. Melanarus is supposed to be the best wrasse for the job. Originally Posted by Sugar Magnolia. Malanarus wrasse is probably the best that i have seen eating and killing flatworms Good luck! Thread Tools. David A. Crandall, M. Fatherree, M. Ken Feldman Jon E. Red Planaria Flatworms can end up being one of the worst challenges you will ever face in the saltwater hobby, just because of how quickly they multiply. Another issue commonly found with having these worms in your system is that when a large number of them die, they release toxins into your water column which can kill or harm both your fish and your corals.
The offence is a good defence when it comes to Red Planaria Flatworms. Dip all corals before putting them into your aquarium, and where possible, quarantine them and monitor them for at least three weeks before putting them into your main display. If you have found them in your main display, remove as many of them as you can manually. A well known and relied upon, reef safe, chemical treatment is Flatworm eXit. I have no experience with Flatworm eXit, so please do your own research before using it in your aquarium.
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