Removing palys

fiji4118

Tang
M.A.S.C Club Member
#1
So I was reading the zoa/paly fish predation thread and started to wonder...Chad mentioned that his nuclear hollys were taking over a rock and covering his GB zoas. I have some of the nukes in my tank and they are growing on a rock that I can not remove. Is there an easy way to keep them in check so they do not overrun the entire rock? Can you scrape them off? Not sure what the paly toxin does when you physically remove them. What about injecting them with pickling lime? I'm sure someone has removed them, I just had not thought about it and I would hate for them to cover some other cooler zoas.

Adam
 

CRW Reef

Blue Whale
M.A.S.C Club Member
ex-officio
#2
I have not tried it but I have heard that aiptasia x works on them, and I would say yes pickling lime and kalk would work too.
 
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#3
I have some mixed in with some other paly's both stay put but the rock they are on is by itself not near other zoas/palys.

sent from my HTC evo 4G
 

jahmic

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
#5
If you don't need them out right away, I've had luck with taking a small piece of rock rubble and reef putty and just sticking that right near the edge of the colony. After a few weeks the polyps I want to remove have grown onto the small rock...then I can easily clip any part of the polyps that are stuck to the main rock with a small pair of shears, and pry off the piece of rubble that they grew onto to remove them. No removing large rocks and no scraping in the DT.

Takes some patience but works for me...just have to stay ahead of the growth and get that rubble in place before they start invading the adjacent rock.
 

jahmic

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
#7
Lol, pretty much. I've been doing this with my pink paly colony since they are circling around my leptastrea. The palys eventually get choked out, but placing those rocks there gives the leptastrea more room to grow when I yank the palys out of the way...might be able to make a pretty cool growth pattern with the leptastrea growing through portions of the paly colony like a river.

So yea...definitely some bonsai coral growth going on in my tank. ;)
 

Bajamike

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
#8
I have had luck with aptasia x the trick is you have to get the needle into the mouth and then inject but it is a constant ordeal
 

ReefCheif

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
Platinum Sponsor
#9
Take rock out, torch pallys. DONE!
 

ReefCheif

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
Platinum Sponsor
#11
Good point, DONT INHALE, and wear eye protection!
 

ReefCheif

Reef Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
Platinum Sponsor
#13
And its not nice, TRUST ME!
 

Rebel

Anthias
M.A.S.C Club Member
#14
I, too, have a large number of what I expect are the "nukes" in my tank and on rocks that it would be impossible to remove. I would like to nuke them, but I am not sure what LFS carries plutonium.

I have used pickling lime and injecting them. It works, but not as effective as aptasia. I have to make sure i inject and not pierce, and I am not shy about the amount of lime I inject. There is sometimes residual damage if something is too near. But not too bad. And it really just thins them until I do it again. A few times a week apart would work best, IMO.
 
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