Brown Jelly Disease in LPS Corals
Brown jelly disease is a fast-moving brown slime of ciliated protozoans and bacteria that can consume an LPS coral such as Euphyllia within a day or two. Learn what causes it, how to recognise it, and the removal and dip steps documented for it.
What brown jelly disease is
Brown jelly disease appears as a brown gelatinous mass on LPS corals such as Euphyllia, Goniopora and brain corals. The mass is made up largely of bacteria and protozoans, of which ciliates are the most abundant and visible under a microscope. The scuticociliate Philaster lucinda has been confirmed in these masses, and it feeds on coral tissue and zooxanthellae.
How fast it kills
Progression is rapid: in documented cases infected corals have died within 24 to 72 hours as the ciliates parasitise the tissue and swallow the zooxanthellae. The trigger that first breaks down the coral tissue is not fully known, but tissue injury and poor conditions are associated with outbreaks.
Documented treatment
- Remove the affected coral from the display into a treatment container.
- Gently remove the brown jelly mass; traditional advice is to frag off and discard clearly diseased tissue.
- Dip the coral: a reef-safe coral dip based on potassium salts has been reported effective against brown-jelly ciliates where antiseptic dips failed.
- A laboratory study found that a clove-extract bath at 1500 ppm for 10 minutes killed the ciliates.
- Return only clearly healthy tissue and keep monitoring for the jelly returning.
Sources: reefbuilders.com ; pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov