Bristle Worms
- Thread starter mangelo
- Start date
singold
New member
Personally, I think the hermits end up being the life of the party most of the time when viewing a saltwater tank. Just my opinion. Just keep some extra shells so they don't kill the snails to take theirs. LFS usually has some extra empty shells. Bristleworms are good scavengers, but must be kept in check, from what I have read.
woodiecrafts
New member
Detrius is fish waste and excess food. As far as the hermits I have several and ust as Singold said, the can be real clowns to watch.
agreeive?fish
New member
Bristle worms seem to me to be verygood at keeping the saturate and rocks clean of excess food build up and to me they seem to be prety self controlling in population control based upon the amount of food avaliable.. i like my bristle worms
Ive heard and read that the worms are not a problem unless they are in big numbers or infestation they may destroy coral if run out of food supply , Ive seen in my buddies tank when he would feed they would come out of everywhere hundreds in a 40g breeder he then cut down the feeding and caught some.. they are easily removed with a worm trap.Otherwise a small family of these guys will just clean up
Saltz Creep
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They're all fun until someone gets hurt
SeaHorseTim
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There are about a zillion species of 'bristle worms'. most are very beneficial, a few are questionable, a couple are probably bad, and a bunch are somewhere in between.
Mostly, though, it's quite unusual to find the 'bad' ones in an aquarium these days. They aren't impossible to catch, but it's pretty much impossible to eliminate the entire population (if you decide you want to).
Unless you see one actively eating a zoanthid or softy, I wouldn't worry about it. Even if you do, it's worth a second look to see if it's actually eating that or some crud around it's base.
Mostly, though, it's quite unusual to find the 'bad' ones in an aquarium these days. They aren't impossible to catch, but it's pretty much impossible to eliminate the entire population (if you decide you want to).
Unless you see one actively eating a zoanthid or softy, I wouldn't worry about it. Even if you do, it's worth a second look to see if it's actually eating that or some crud around it's base.
Skeptic_07
New member
i've had rows and rows of the bristle stuck in me hand from carelessly grabbing a rock out of my sump that had a large worm on it. Itchy and unplesant but couldve been easily avoided if i was paying attention. Also, i did not get a rash like the one pictured above. Nothing like that, i just removed the bristles with some tape the rest just dissolved with no ill effects. I'm going to guess that theres different levels of reactions to these things
Dave & Monica
New member
Blue leg hermits are great and I have both (red too).Do keep extra shells and you'll have them a long time (unless you buy aggressive fish that find them tasty).
Bristleworms are apart of the eco system. At one time I had flatworms and the chemical called flat worm exit to treat these had an unusual effect on bristleworms - They would come out in the light and twitch around which make them easy to pick out.
My wife puts this little trap in there we bought for like $10 for fosters and smith and pulls some out from time to time. I just leave em.
/ Dave
Bristleworms are apart of the eco system. At one time I had flatworms and the chemical called flat worm exit to treat these had an unusual effect on bristleworms - They would come out in the light and twitch around which make them easy to pick out.
My wife puts this little trap in there we bought for like $10 for fosters and smith and pulls some out from time to time. I just leave em.
/ Dave
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