Help, what is this creature?!

[Collettejd1986]

Ok so I'm new to this saltwater tank stuff, I started with a tropical and after about 3 weeks visited a not so LFS and decided a saltwater was where I wanted to be. So a lot of money spent and a lot of changing around and I now have a saltwater tank set up, its about 29 Gallon with plenty of live rock, 2 clowns, a clean up crew and an arrow head crab.

All is generally going well except for a little brown algae which I'm in the process of trying to eliminate, however I have woken up this morning to find a HUGE GREAT BIG centipede type thing eating my blood shrimp!
Im a little miffed to say the least and freaked out, this creture was not nice looking and was coming from one of my live rocks. The part of it I could see was a good 5 inches long (the rest if it was still inside the rock) and was yellow/tan in colour, it was quite skinny and looked like it has lots and lots of little legs?

Does anybody know what it is? And did it kill my Shrimp? The shrimp looked to be in the middle of sheading its skin, part was already off and the rest was still attached to the shrimp but im sure the shrimp is dead, and like I said the worm type thing was all wrapped around it? As soon as I turned the lights on to get a better look the worm was fast as lightening and dissapeared back into the live rock. The shrimp is still not moving!?

Can any body help a complete novice with any advice about this creature and what to do with it??

Thanks

 

[zoalover34]

It's probably a bristle worm of some sort, they normally don't kill livestock.. The shrimp was more than likely dead and the worm was just doing what they do.. It would be easier to ID it with a picture if you could get 1..

 

[Collettejd1986]

Yeah I thought it was probably a bristle worm but cannot find any pictures online that look anything like mine?

I will try and get a picture, however in 4 weeks this is the first time I've seen it and it was keen to hide as soon as it saw me, so think this might be a pretty difficult task?

Is it worth trying to catch the creature, it seriously creeps me out just thinking about it and there are many mixed reviews online about weather they are good or bad for your tank? Do you have any experience with them?

Thanks

 

[paperdog9]

Did it look like this? I'm pretty sure you can get fish that eat them, maybe some kind of wrasse?

 

[Collettejd1986]

I have looked into a wrasse but I'm not sure which I can keep in my smaller tank?
Let me know if you have any ideas?

It looked similar to the one in that picture but wasnt flat, it was very long (I saw 5 inches of it easily, the rest was still hiding in the rock) and it was very skinny, and more a yellow colour? It really looked just like a garden centipede, with a segmented body and a harder looking body almost shell like?

The worm hunt is on!

 

[Lorna]

you could try trapping it. The larger ones like this are not a good thing but the small ones that inhabit your sand bed are great detrivores. I would try and catch it with tweezers when the lights are out, put a red film over a flashlight so you can see and go get him.

 

[mlipst]

At one time I had many small bristleworms. I used a trap to remove many of them and got a six line wrasse to take care of others. Hadn't seen any for about a year, but I found one a couple of months ago munching on some Xenia during the day. It looked like a monster. When it saw me, it quickly retreated into the rock. I took out the rock and placed in in a bucket with some water. The worm came out completely from the rock and I then rinsed off the rock, blew out any holes with a baster and water to see if there were more, and put the rock back into the tank. This thing was fifteen inches long. This is it across the bottom of the five gallon bucket.




I had to kill it. Haven't seen any since.

 

[Newman]

0_0

that is very frightening...

 

[Collettejd1986]

Yes I'm definatly going to try trapping it! It really gives me the creeps just knowing it is in there, eeerrrgghhhh!
As for tweezers this thing moves just so fast, litterally it is there then gone in the blink of an eye and I only have to make the tiniest movement and it just dissappears.
Have this evening put in a coke bottle with some holes and bait and a nylon stocking trick, so will keep all posted as to how these work.

Mlipst.... no mine looks nothing like that though it's hard to judge. the one in the bucket looks really fat? Mine is very skinny les than 5mm across and doesnt seem to get any fatter or skinnier just very long? Also what water did you soak your rock in to get it to come out? Diid u use saltwater from your tank, RO or Tap out of interest, may be the next thing on my worm hunting agenda if the tonights bait shows no signs of working?

Thanks for your ideas.

 

[littletankbigworld]

*shiver* That's disgusting! I cannot imagine finding one of those in my tank one day. I wish you the best of luck!!!

 

[Newman]

yea seriously. this one just makes me want to skip uncured rock and all the excitement of finding cool little hitchickers...if the risk involves THAT THING then I'll buy fully cured rock, thank you lol.

I really hope you can get the worm out of your aquarium, because It certainly will not be beneficial at that size...

I also found this article:
"Whereas small bristle worms may look really harmless, larger specimens that have grown to sizes of 24 inches or more in length are quite impressive and can cause serious damage. Remember too that the size you see is not necessarily the size of the worm. It may be retracted and look short and thick, but it can stretch itself to a real long size and be very thin. In either case it is a voracious eater." http://www.aquapages.info/index3.html

So maybe your's was just stretched out. but a max of 24" is damn insane Dx

Also did it look like this:
http://www.mv.com/users/besposito/pics/bristle1.jpg

w/e it is you should deffo remove it by all means...

 

[Frogki]

I can see your getting mixed reviews here as well... lol... I am not very experienced in salt aquaria either, however I am very well read according to most, and I have a reef keeping book that might be able to clear this up. The bad bristle worms (i.a. large ones, carnivorous large), while found in aquaria, are extremely rare and most of the time the bristle worms are actually beneficial detrius eaters...

 

[Newman]

yea they are, but the ones that grow large like this guy has, should definitely be removed before it eats other living stuff...

 

[mlipst]

This guy had. The point of my message was that I was able to remove this monster from my tank fairly easily. To Collettejd1986 - I used tank water. I just poured about one liter of water over the rock and the worm came out very quickly. Knowing which rock it is in is key.

 

[mlipst]

And all of the rock in my tank was cured when purchased. This particular piece (although it's impossible to know that it's the one the worm came in on) was in my tank for six years.

 

[unwritten law]

I heard arrow crabs eat them, but that seems like a large one.

 

[Fishmonger70]

I read that somewhere too. Can't remember where, but it said that Arrow crabs will eat Bristle Worms.

 

[Fishmonger70]

I found it. The article said that several species of Wrasses, Copperbanded Butterflyfish, Banded Coral Shrimp and Arrow Crabs may consume Bristle Worms. Not sure if this is true about the larger ones, but will probably take care of the smaller ones anyway.

 

[Collettejd1986]

Wow thank you for all your ideas, Unknowingly I brought a arrow head crab and a coral banded shrimp just because I liked them, I thing this guy is probably too big for them to eat though. A wrasse may be an idea but will speak to my LFS when I go in for RO water at the weekend and see if I can take one home with me.

Night 1 of the traps with bait was unsucessful, but hey maybe he wasnt hungry after feasting on my fire shrimp? I kept having a look but didnt see him at all. Will try again this evening.

Mlipst, thanks for letting me know about the water, I'm sure I know what rock he is in so will give that a go later too and see if I can flush him out.

Wish me luck for night 2 of the worm hunt!

Thanks Again!

 

[Lorna]

Whether you buy cured or uncured rock will not determine if you will have bristle worms.....I have fully cured rock and it came with bristle worms which I am thankful for as stated they are great detrivores when small. Keep trying to trap it......