Green star polyps parasite?

[bdelaney]

I have a small rock with green star polyps on it, and there has always a few small patches where the polyps are never fully expanded. The rest of the colony seems to be thriving.

The other day while looking closely at this coral, I noticed a small tentacle poking out from one of the holes in the rock. It was translucent with a little pincer on the end of it that would grab hold of the open star polyp and pull off a piece. The tentacle would retract back into the hole and come out of another nearby hole only to "attack" another polyp.

I don't have a high quality digital camera, so I cannot get a picture of it. I can barely see it with my own eyes. Does anyone have any idea of what this could be?

I am considering a freshwater dip on my star polys to try and kill this thing before it kills the rest of my star polyps. Does anyone know if star polyps will survive a freshwater dip?

Any other comments or suggestions would be appreciated.

 

[Anonymous]

Never heard of such predator before... maybe it is just a spagitti(you know, the Italian noodle..) worm or something harmless like that....

Freshwater dip only work for getting rid off invert parasite on a vertibrate. In your case, both are invert, so very likely, either both survive, or both die. Don't work for you... but maybe scoop the sand up and hopefully caught the "culpit" (I doubt it is harmful...) and get rid of it that way.... good luck.

 

[bdelaney]

It's inside the rock, so I'm considering squirting some crazy glue into the holes to try to seal it in. I think that might do the trick. I killed some aptasia that way once, and it worked well.

 

[fungia]

wow that sounds alien. i wish you could get a picture of it, i have never heard or seen anything like it. good look getting rid of it. i used to use some underwater epoxy to kill things in holes so if superglue doesnt work you can try that.

 

[grav]

That glue idea sounds crazy to me.

Not that it is wrong. I just figure, if there is one, there are two. Gluing em all down... hoping to fill every possible escape point... you could never do it. Just mess up the tank.

Could be wrong.