Freshwater Dips - General Rules of Thumb?

[Dewman]

Does anyone have any pertinent information I might need before I freshwater dip all of my acorals and a little of the live rock I am transferring into my new tank?

As I have posted before, after getting my MH lighting the Feather caulerpa took off. I have red flat worms that are living on the leaves of the macro and I was looking for a way to rid the old tank's inhabitants of the flatworms before I drop them into the new tank.
I tested some of the macro by taking it out and dropping into RODI. The worms shriveled and fell to the bottom.

I was thinking that a 30 second "slosh" in a bucket of RODI wouldn't hurt anything?
I plan on making the xfer in two stages. I take everything out of the original tank "washing" it as I go.
Next, I will drop everything into a rubbermaid tote filled with regular tank water. This will allow more of the little beasties to drop off or abandon the rock.
I was going to let everything sit in there overnight at the right temperature and then do the last transfer the following day into the new tank.

Does anyone see any problems with this plan?

 

[bleedingthought]

From what I understand, mostly from WetWebMedia, corals and inverts should never be freshwater dipped...

 

[Anonymous]

Never dip an invertibrate. I recommend not dipping or quarantening fish either, unless your quarantene tank is an established aquarium that the fish could easily call a permanent home.

 

[Anonymous]

I dip wild caught hermits to clean their shells. I don't dip anything else though.

 

[WRASSER]

If you are really that worried about your corals, rocks and such, give them a salt water wash down before you put them into the new tank.

 

[Dewman]

Woops, I guess you're right.

I read a little more and about it.
I guess I just need to use my power head and blast off all of the liverock with new tank makeup water.

As for all of the corals, the LPS and SPS I can just "swish" around in the new makeup water.
But the polyp rocks are all going to have to be quarintined.
The flatworms love the polyps. I have a feeling they are hardy enough to survive a dip in RODI.

Does anyone have any more views on dipping?

 

[bleedingthought]

If you really want to try, give a small rock with polyps on it a quick, 15-30 second, bath and see how it does before you go with any other ones.

Also, make sure you've got the temp and PH right in the freshwater.

 

[Anonymous]

I killed a maroon by dipping it. I had read about what a great idea this was, back 8 years ago, and so I made up some fresh water, put in some pH 8.4 buffer stuff I bought at the fish store, stuck my maroon in it for the time recommended in the book I was reading, and when I turned around, it was dead.

What happened was I did not read the instructions on the buffer, which was made for African chichlids from Lake Tanganikia. The buffer was essentially the base and the chichlid salt you were supposed to add was the acid component. As a consequence the pH was around 11 or 12, and I had murdered my fish.

This was especially unpleasant because I am a chemist. I know how to make buffers. I should have measured the pH. I was in a hurry and didn't read the instructions carefully, and, worse, didn't just check the pH of the water. I now keep pH paper on hand just to do spot-checks to make sure a solution of saltwater or whatever is approximately what I want.

Since then I have never dipped anything. I never had a fish introduce a disease. I've killed fish by dipping and by quarentine. Ich is not that big a deal, and it is unlikely you will introduce amyloodinium because it is so lethal, your fish would never make it as far as your home without showing symptoms. I haven't seen that disease in a long time.

Some people will treat a fish for ich by tossing it in a healthy reef tank.

 

[Dewman]

I am going to ditch it all and just use Flatworm Exit baths.
That way I will not have to risk killing off any of the other critters.

I obviously didn't read very much about this before I posted.

I'll just give everything an exit treatment just before I move it all.

 

[Anonymous]

One thing I read not too long ago was the idea of using either a hypersaline or CO2-saturated saline solution to dip live rock in order to drive out mantis shrimp.

Anyone try that?

My main worry now is introducing aiptasia. If there was something I could dip to kill them, I would gladly risk the life of my coral or even my children.

 

[Dewman]

I saw an aquacultered Nudibranch on DRSFOSTERSMITH that specifically eats aptasia.
But of course as with all prey specific animals, they will starve if a tank isn't heavily populated with aptasia though.
I guess you could "rent" one and then sell it to your LFS after you're done.

 

[Anonymous]

Spent 300 dollars on those, too. I bought 5, including two breeders. They laid lots of eggs. In short, I never got anywhere.

 

[bleedingthought]

I would just kill single aiptasias if/as they appear and hope to God you don't have an epidemic again!

 

[Anonymous]

My guess is the outbreak/epidemic was greatly accelerated by overall tank decline.

The nudibranches ate aiptasia in culture, but they would eat like one every week. They spawned a lot, and I could see the eggs hatch under my microscope, and even have the pictures somewhere, but none rely developed. One by one the adults died.